Five Crucial Incidents in the Rollback of the Rights of Women and Girls in 2025.
In the previous year, groups dedicated to gender equality were bracing themselves for a return of Donald Trump to office. Hardly anyone anticipated. The flood and velocity of executive orders issued from the White House were regarded as a premeditated approach to induce a state of shock. This strategy had its intended impact – there was chaos, resentment, and burnout as groups rushed to compensate for the loss left by a abrupt cessation of financial support. But this was only the precursor.
The Washington leadership has been the primary force, complemented by fervent lobbying efforts by far-right organisations exploiting the situation to strengthen global ties with like-minded governments.
The movement against gender equality signifies a transnational grouping of elected officials, faith-based bodies, non-governmental organisations as well as ultra-rich backers and donors that seek to undermine gains in a variety of areas. This covers access to termination, gay and trans protections, alternative households, and factual sexual instruction.
They pursue this agenda via influencing policymakers, funding litigation, undermining global initiatives to foster equity, propagating misinformation, and bankrolling sympathetic charities.
We analyze five junctures that shaped the security, respect, and well-being of the female population.
USAID Effectively Dismantled
In March, six weeks after a prominent humanitarian funder is suspended, causing turmoil around the world, a senior US official announces that a vast majority of the organization's initiatives will be axed. US diplomats, past leaders and aid and medical specialists criticize the move, stating that lives will be lost. Human rights advocates say that the closure of the organization is more than a funding crisis, it is a brutal assault on fundamental freedoms and access to contraception and reproductive health services. A multitude of agencies say the impact on girls and women will be severe by diminishing aid, especially in regions of instability. As the year ends, reports confirm how a tremendous loss of life has already occurred from sickness, hunger, poor pregnancy healthcare, and abuse targeting females, with millions more to come. Another pair of leading funders proceed with parallel slashes. A leader of an international advocacy group says a move to cut foreign aid drastically is an attempt to placate a powerful partner.
Conservative Religious Groups Lobby at UN Women Meeting
In the same month, several conservative religious groups meet in an luxury Manhattan venue for a biannual gathering held in parallel 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 celebrate shifts in US policy on LGBTQ issues, inclusion, and reproductive rights. Meanwhile, the head of the United Nations opens the global conference with a grave caution that “the toxin of gendered hierarchy” is resurgent, after a analysis demonstrates that anti-rights actors are deliberately weakening established norms on fundamental freedoms for women around the world.
Conferences on Traditional Values in Africa
Over the summer, a cluster of meetings in Africa themed around the conservative family structures and national independence raises concerns among equality campaigners. In the start of May, a national leader and spouse open a significant conference to push back on what they label criminal foreign forces eroding traditional family values. A soon after, another regional summit on family values is held. Both events are participated in by leading US and European anti-rights figures, including leaders of well-known groups. One speaker exhorts African NGOs to stand up to “international liberal agenda” of multilateral bodies. In June, a major religious institution hosts a gathering about supporting traditional households in West Africa, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become a forum for opposing queer and trans rights. Activists observe that the scale of their presence has expanded considerably.
US Threat to Destroy Contraceptives
As clinics in sub-Saharan Africa report they are facing shortages of birth control, including prophylaxis for assault victims, the US announces in midsummer plans to destroy millions of dollars worth of contraceptives held in a warehouse in Europe. A major reproductive health federation states that their incineration will prevent millions of women and girls from contraceptive supplies, and lead to hundreds of thousands of unintended pregnancies and unsafe abortions. The organization labels the plan an dogmatic choice “about exporting a regressive policy worldwide” and “a deliberate form of reproductive oppression”. A renowned doctors' group calls it “callous and reckless”. Aid groups propose purchasing the contraceptives so they can reach their intended destinations, but the US declines every proposal. The situation remains at a standstill as host nation officials are blocking usable products to be destroyed.
Widening of the Anti-Abortion Policy
Bringing back the anti-abortion funding ban, which cuts American funding for groups that provide, advocate for or advise on abortion services overseas, is standard practice for certain US administrations. It was widely expected when the rule was reinstated in the first month of the year. 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 cover diversity programmes. Further specifics about the broader enforcement are likely forthcoming. A leader in global maternal health says broadening the policy will have “devastating consequences”. Reproductive justice campaigners fear that fresh American assistance deals being arranged with states on the continent will become conditional on accepting the new, wider policy.
