Five Defining Key Moments in the Challenge to the Freedoms of Women and Girls in This Past Year.
In the previous year, organisations advocating for women's rights were anticipating a second Trump term. Hardly anyone anticipated. The volume and speed of presidential directives issued from the White House were seen as a premeditated approach to overwhelm and create panic. To a large extent, it succeeded – there was disarray, outrage, and weariness as organisations scrambled to plug the hole left by a abrupt cessation of financial support. But the situation was about to worsen.
The US administration has been the primary force, supported by intense advocacy work by ultra-conservative groups seizing the opportunity to strengthen global ties with political allies.
This opposition to progressive rights signifies a transnational grouping of elected officials, faith-based bodies, non-governmental organisations as well as ultra-rich backers and donors that aim to roll back progress across a wide spectrum of issues. This encompasses pro-choice policies, equality for sexual minorities, gender identity recognition, and inclusive relationship teaching.
They pursue this agenda via influencing policymakers, funding litigation, undermining global initiatives to promote fairness, circulating falsehoods, and resourcing aligned NGOs.
We look at five moments that impacted the safety, dignity and lives of girls and women.
USAID Effectively Dismantled
In early spring, six weeks after a prominent humanitarian funder is halted, causing global disruption, a leading figure in the administration confirms that the lion's share of the body's projects will be terminated. American foreign service officers, past leaders and relief and public health authorities condemn the news, warning that people will die as a result. Human rights advocates say that the demise of the agency is more than a funding crisis, it is a savage attack on human rights and birth control and maternal healthcare. 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, statistics reveal 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. Additional key contributing countries follow with their own cuts. A director of a global justice organization says a decision to slash billions in overseas assistance is a gesture of alignment with another government's agenda.
Conservative Religious Groups Lobby at UN Women Meeting
In March, several conservative religious groups meet in an upmarket New York hotel for a biannual gathering held alongside the UN's flagship gender equality meeting. It is an opportunity to share tactics on how to defeat the UN’s “radical agenda”. They are in high spirits as they applaud shifts in US policy on social issues and termination of pregnancy. Meanwhile, the head of the United Nations opens the women’s summit with a stark warning that “the toxin of gendered hierarchy” is resurgent, after a analysis demonstrates that groups opposing progressive rights 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 traditional family and national sovereignty triggers anxiety among rights advocates. In the start of May, a national leader and spouse open a major forum to resist what they label external influences undermining local norms. A few days later, another regional summit on traditional morals is held. Both events are participated in by leading Western campaigners against gender ideology, including heads of influential networks. One speaker urges African NGOs to push back against “worldwide progressive social restructuring” of global institutions. In the following month, a major religious institution hosts a gathering about supporting traditional households in an African nation, an event that pro-choice campaigners say has become an anti-LGBTQ, anti-gender platform. Advocates remark that the extent of foreign involvement has increased markedly.
Contraceptive Destruction Order
As health facilities across Africa report they are facing shortages of birth control, including post-rape care packages, the US announces in July plans to incinerate millions of dollars worth of contraceptives held in a storage facility in Belgium. A leading family planning organization states that their destruction will deny millions of women and girls from family planning options, and lead to a public health crisis of unwanted pregnancies. The organization labels the plan an dogmatic choice “about exporting a regressive policy worldwide” and “a deliberate form of reproductive oppression”. A prominent medical humanitarian organization calls it “heartless and dangerous”. Aid groups propose purchasing the contraceptives so they can be distributed to those in need, but the US declines every proposal. The situation remains in deadlock as local authorities will not allow the destruction of viable medicines.
Widening of the Anti-Abortion Policy
Reviving the global gag rule, which prohibits Washington's support for groups that offer, promote, or give information about abortion services overseas, is standard practice for certain US administrations. It was anticipated when the ban was reimposed in January. The administration also signed onto a conservative consensus document. But in the autumn, the US announces it intends to broaden the scope of the policy to include sovereign states and UN agencies in addition to NGOs, and to encompass equity and inclusion initiatives. Further specifics about the expansion of the rule are anticipated next year. A leader in global maternal health says extending the reach will have “catastrophic impacts”. Advocates for bodily autonomy fear that upcoming Washington funding agreements being negotiated with countries in Africa will become contingent upon adopting the broadened restrictions.
