Five Significant Developments in the Assault on the Rights of Women and Girls in the Year 2025.
In the previous year, feminist advocacy groups were anticipating a return of Donald Trump to office. Scarcely anyone expected. The volume and speed of administrative decrees emanating from the White House were seen as a premeditated approach to paralyze through overload. In many ways it worked – there was bewilderment, fury, and fatigue as networks struggled to compensate for the loss left by a freeze on international development funds. But this was only the precursor.
The US administration has been the main instigator, supported by relentless activism by ultra-conservative groups exploiting the situation to strengthen global ties with like-minded governments.
The anti-rights movement signifies a transnational grouping of elected officials, faith-based bodies, non-governmental organisations as well as affluent financiers and clans that seek to undermine advances on numerous fronts. This encompasses abortion, LGBTQ rights, trans rights, non-traditional family structures and comprehensive sexuality education.
They pursue this agenda via advocating to officials, financing legal challenges, sabotaging multilateral work to push for parity, disseminating propaganda, and supporting ideologically-matched groups.
We examine five moments that impacted the welfare, autonomy, and survival of females globally.
USAID Dismantled
In early spring, shortly after a prominent humanitarian funder is frozen, causing widespread distress, a leading figure in the administration reveals that a vast majority of the organization's initiatives will be axed. American foreign service officers, former presidents and relief and public health authorities denounce the action, stating that people will die as a result. Activists say that the closure of the organization is more than a funding crisis, it is a vicious offensive against basic liberties and birth control and maternal healthcare. Many organisations say the impact on girls and women will be severe by waning support, especially in regions of instability. As the year ends, statistics reveal how a significant mortality toll has been exacted from sickness, hunger, poor pregnancy healthcare, and abuse targeting females, with many more millions at risk. Two other major donor nations announce their own austerity measures. A director of a global justice organization says a choice to reduce international development funding is a move to appease a political ally.
Christian-Right Groups Raise Voices During UN Women Summit
In March, several conservative religious groups meet in an high-end hotel in NYC for a biannual gathering held concurrently with the annual UN Women gathering. It is an forum to discuss methods on how to defeat the UN’s “radical agenda”. They are in high spirits as they welcome new Washington directives on LGBTQ issues, inclusion, and reproductive rights. Meanwhile, the head of the United Nations opens the gender equality forum with a grave caution that “the poison of patriarchy” is returning, after a report shows that groups opposing progressive rights are systematically eroding longstanding consensus on core aspects of gender equality around the world.
Conferences on Traditional Values in Africa
Over the warmer months, a cluster of meetings in Africa centered on the conservative family structures and national independence raises concerns among rights advocates. In the start of May, a national leader and spouse open a major forum to combat what they label criminal foreign forces eroding traditional family values. A few days later, another regional summit on family values is held. Both events are attended by leading American and European conservative activists, including presidents of prominent organizations. One speaker exhorts African NGOs to resist “worldwide progressive social restructuring” of international organizations. In the following month, a major religious institution hosts a family strengthening conference in the region, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become an anti-LGBTQ, anti-gender platform. Advocates remark that the extent of foreign involvement has grown significantly.
American Plan to Burn Birth Control
As medical centers in numerous African countries report they are depleting their stocks of family planning supplies, including emergency kits for survivors of sexual violence, the US announces in July plans to destroy a significant cache of reproductive health commodities held in a European depot. A global sexual health network states that their destruction will deny a huge female population from access to birth control, and lead to hundreds of thousands of unintended pregnancies and unsafe abortions. The organization labels the plan an politically-motivated move “about exporting a regressive policy worldwide” and “a calculated move to control fertility”. A prominent medical humanitarian organization calls it “callous and reckless”. Charities attempt to acquire the contraceptives so they can reach their intended destinations, but the US rejects each bid. The situation remains unresolved as the regional government refuse to permit usable products to be destroyed.
Widening of the Anti-Abortion Policy
Reinstating the Mexico City Policy, which halts US aid to groups that provide, advocate for or advise on abortion services overseas, is commonplace under certain US administrations. It was widely expected when the rule was reinstated in January. The administration also rejoined an international anti-abortion agreement. But in the autumn, the US announces it intends to expand the global gag rule to include national governments and international bodies in addition to NGOs, and to include DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) projects. Additional information regarding the policy's widened application are expected in early 2026. A expert in child welfare says extending the reach will have “unimaginable effects”. Reproductive justice campaigners fear that new US aid packages being discussed with African nations will become conditional on accepting the broadened restrictions.
