A Quintet of Key Moments in the Erosion of the Freedoms of Women and Girls in 2025.
This time last year, women’s rights organisations were steeling themselves against a new Trump administration. Scarcely anyone expected. The volume and speed of executive orders coming out of the White House were seen as a calculated strategy to overwhelm and create panic. To a large extent, it succeeded – there was confusion, anger and exhaustion as networks struggled to compensate for the loss left by a freeze on international development funds. But this merely marked the opening act.
The Washington leadership has been the main instigator, bolstered by fervent lobbying efforts by deeply conservative factions exploiting the situation to build worldwide connections with like-minded governments.
The movement against gender equality refers to a global network of political leaders, religious institutions, civil society groups as well as wealthy philanthropists and dynasties that strive to weaken advances on numerous fronts. Areas targeted involve reproductive choice, queer and transgender freedoms, diverse family models, and honest sex ed.
They pursue this agenda via lobbying governments, supporting court cases, discrediting international efforts to advance equality, spreading disinformation, and funding non-profit organisations.
We review five instances that influenced the protection, honor, and existence of the female population.
USAID Dismantled
In the month of March, six weeks after a prominent humanitarian funder is its funds are blocked, causing global disruption, a top American diplomat confirms that a vast majority of the agency’s programmes will be eliminated. Career diplomats, ex-presidents and humanitarian and health experts denounce the action, warning that lives will be lost. Rights defenders say that the closure of the organization is not just a financial shortfall, it is a savage attack on human rights and birth control and maternal healthcare. Numerous groups say women and girls will be disproportionately affected by reduced funding, especially in conflict areas. As the year ends, evidence indicates how a tremendous loss of life has already occurred from disease, starvation, lack of access to maternal care and gender-based violence, with many more millions at risk. Two other major donor nations follow with their own cuts. A head of a worldwide campaign network says a move to cut foreign aid drastically is a gesture of alignment with another government's agenda.
Faith-Based Activists Mobilize at UN Conference
In March, several conservative religious groups meet in an high-end hotel in NYC for a biannual gathering held in parallel with the international conference on women's rights. It is an opportunity to share tactics on how to defeat the UN’s “radical agenda”. They are in buoyant mood as they applaud shifts in US policy on LGBTQ issues, inclusion, and reproductive rights. Meanwhile, the head of the United Nations opens the gender equality forum with a stark warning that “the venom of male dominance” is returning, after a analysis demonstrates that anti-rights actors are deliberately weakening established norms on key women’s rights issues around the world.
Summits Promoting Conservative Norms
Over the warmer months, a cluster of meetings in Africa centered on the conservative family structures and national independence sparks alarm among equality campaigners. In the start of May, a national leader and spouse open a large assembly to push back on what they label external influences undermining local norms. A few days later, another continental gathering on conservative ethics 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 push back against “international liberal agenda” of multilateral bodies. In June, a global faith group hosts a event focused on reinforcing families in West Africa, an event that pro-choice campaigners say has become a forum for opposing queer and trans rights. Campaigners note that the extent of foreign involvement has increased markedly.
American Plan to Burn Birth Control
As clinics in sub-Saharan Africa report they are running out of contraceptives, including emergency kits for survivors of sexual violence, the US announces in July plans to destroy a vast stockpile of birth control held in a European depot. A leading family planning organization states that their destruction will deny countless females from access to birth control, and lead to a surge in unplanned pregnancies and dangerous terminations. The organization labels the plan an ideological decision “about forcing a conservative worldview globally” and “an intentional act of reproductive coercion”. A international emergency medical charity calls it “callous and reckless”. Aid groups propose purchasing the contraceptives so they can fulfill their original purpose, but the US rejects each bid. The situation remains unresolved as host nation officials are blocking perfectly good supplies to be incinerated.
Broader Restrictions on Aid
Reinstating the Mexico City Policy, which cuts American funding for groups that provide, advocate for or advise on abortion services overseas, is typical of certain US administrations. It was anticipated when the rule was reinstated in the first month of the year. The administration also signed onto a conservative consensus document. But in October, the US announces it intends to extend the restrictions to include governments and multilateral organisations in addition to NGOs, and to cover diversity programmes. More details on the expansion of the rule are expected in early 2026. A director of a major health partnership says extending the reach will have “catastrophic impacts”. Advocates for bodily autonomy fear that fresh American assistance deals being discussed with African nations will become dependent on agreeing to the broadened restrictions.
