Five Significant Developments in the Erosion of the Rights of Women and Girls in 2025.
A year ago, feminist advocacy groups were steeling themselves against a new Trump administration. Few were prepared for. The volume and speed of presidential directives coming out of the White House were viewed as a intentional maneuver to overwhelm and create panic. This strategy had its intended impact – there was disarray, outrage, and weariness as agencies hastened to plug the hole left by a freeze on international development funds. But this merely marked the opening act.
The Trump administration has been the key driver, aided by relentless activism by deeply conservative factions seizing the opportunity to build worldwide connections with ideological partners.
The movement against gender equality signifies a transnational grouping of government figures, churches, and advocacy collectives as well as billionaire families and individuals that seek to undermine gains in a variety of areas. These include reproductive choice, queer and transgender freedoms, diverse family models, and honest sex ed.
They achieve this through advocating to officials, financing legal challenges, sabotaging multilateral work to advance equality, spreading disinformation, and funding non-profit organisations.
We look at five episodes that impacted the safety, dignity and lives of the female population.
USAID Dismantled
In March, a month and a half following a key American development organization is suspended, causing turmoil around the world, a leading figure in the administration reveals that over eighty percent of the body's projects will be terminated. US diplomats, ex-presidents and aid and medical specialists decry the decision, stating that mortality will increase. Rights defenders say that the demise of the agency is greater than a budgetary issue, it is a savage attack on human rights and access to contraception and reproductive health services. Numerous groups say women and girls will be disproportionately affected by reduced funding, especially in war zones. As the year ends, data shows how a significant mortality toll has been exacted from disease, starvation, lack of access to maternal care and gender-based violence, with millions more to come. Additional key contributing countries follow with their own cuts. A leader of an international advocacy group 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 the same month, several Christian-right organisations meet in an upmarket New York hotel for a strategic summit held in parallel with the international conference on women's rights. It is an opportunity to share tactics on how to counter the UN's progressive policies. They are in buoyant mood as they celebrate changes in American foreign policy on LGBTQ issues, inclusion, and reproductive rights. Meanwhile, the world's top diplomat opens the global conference with a somber alert that “the toxin of gendered hierarchy” is returning, after a report shows that groups opposing progressive rights are actively undermining established norms on core aspects of gender equality around the world.
African ‘Family Values’ Conferences
Over the warmer months, a series of conferences in Africa themed around the conventional household and state autonomy raises concerns among rights advocates. In early May, a national leader and spouse open a significant conference to push back on what they label external influences undermining local norms. A few days later, another Pan-African conference on traditional morals is held. Both events are participated in by leading US and European anti-rights figures, including presidents of prominent organizations. One speaker calls on African NGOs to push back against “radical global social engineering” 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 a forum for opposing queer and trans rights. Campaigners note that the scale of their presence has expanded considerably.
American Plan to Burn Birth Control
As medical centers in numerous African countries report they are running out of contraceptives, including prophylaxis for assault victims, the US announces in midsummer plans to incinerate a significant cache of reproductive health commodities held in a European depot. A major reproductive health federation states that their elimination will deprive a huge female population from contraceptive supplies, and lead to a surge in unplanned pregnancies and dangerous terminations. The organization labels the plan an ideological decision “about imposing an anti-rights agenda on the entire world” and “an intentional act of reproductive coercion”. A international emergency medical charity calls it “cruel and irresponsible”. NGOs offer to buy the contraceptives so they can fulfill their original purpose, but the US rejects each bid. The situation remains unresolved as the regional government are blocking usable products to be destroyed.
Broader Restrictions on Aid
Reviving the global gag rule, which cuts American funding for groups that provide, advocate for or advise on abortion services overseas, is standard practice for certain US administrations. It came as no surprise when the ban was reimposed in the first month of the year. The administration also signed onto a conservative consensus document. But in the autumn, the US announces it intends to extend the restrictions to include sovereign states and UN agencies in addition to NGOs, and to encompass equity and inclusion initiatives. Additional information regarding the policy's widened application are likely forthcoming. A leader in global maternal health says widening the scope will have “devastating consequences”. Pro-choice activists fear that new US aid packages being negotiated with countries in Africa will become contingent upon adopting the broadened restrictions.
