Five Defining Landmark Occurrences in the Assault on the Rights of Women and Girls in 2025.
A year ago, groups dedicated to gender equality were steeling themselves against a Trump presidency sequel. Few were prepared for. The flood and velocity of executive orders coming out of the White House were interpreted as a premeditated approach to overwhelm and create panic. In many ways it worked – there was chaos, resentment, and burnout as agencies hastened to fill the gap left by a abrupt cessation of financial support. But this merely marked the opening act.
The US administration has been the main instigator, complemented by vigorous campaigning by far-right organisations exploiting the situation to forge international alliances with like-minded governments.
Often termed the anti-gender movement denotes an international coalition of political leaders, religious institutions, civil society groups as well as ultra-rich backers and donors that strive to weaken progress across a wide spectrum of issues. This encompasses reproductive choice, queer and transgender freedoms, diverse family models, and honest sex ed.
They accomplish their goals by pressuring states, backing lawsuits, disparaging UN work to promote fairness, circulating falsehoods, and resourcing aligned NGOs.
We analyze five moments that affected the welfare, autonomy, and survival of the female population.
The Dismantling of USAID
In March, a month and a half following a key American development organization is halted, causing global disruption, a senior US official announces that a vast majority of the agency’s programmes will be eliminated. Career diplomats, ex-presidents and humanitarian and health experts criticize the move, cautioning that lives will be lost. Activists say that the demise of the agency is greater than a budgetary issue, it is a brutal assault on fundamental freedoms and birth control and maternal healthcare. A multitude of agencies say the impact on girls and women will be severe by reduced funding, especially in regions of instability. 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 a far greater catastrophe looming. Additional key contributing countries follow with their own cuts. A head of a worldwide campaign network says a move to cut foreign aid drastically is a move to appease a political ally.
Christian-Right Groups Raise Voices During UN Women Summit
In the same month, several faith-based advocacy networks meet in an luxury Manhattan venue for a biannual gathering held alongside 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 high spirits as they welcome shifts in US policy on social issues and termination of pregnancy. Meanwhile, the world's top diplomat opens the global conference with a somber alert that “the venom of male dominance” is returning, after a study indicates that anti-rights actors are deliberately weakening longstanding consensus on fundamental freedoms for women around the world.
Conferences on Traditional Values in Africa
Over the warmer months, a sequence of gatherings in Africa themed around the traditional family and national sovereignty sparks alarm among human rights defenders. In early May, a head of state and partner open a significant conference to resist what they label criminal foreign forces eroding traditional family values. A few days later, another Pan-African conference 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 urges African NGOs to resist “international liberal agenda” of international organizations. In the following month, a global faith group hosts a family strengthening conference in an African nation, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become an anti-LGBTQ, anti-gender platform. Campaigners note that the extent of foreign involvement has grown significantly.
American Plan to Burn Birth Control
As health facilities across 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 European depot. A leading family planning organization states that their incineration will prevent millions of women and girls from contraceptive supplies, and lead to a public health crisis of unwanted pregnancies. The organization labels the plan an ideological decision “about exporting a regressive policy worldwide” and “a deliberate form of reproductive oppression”. 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 local authorities refuse to permit perfectly good supplies to be incinerated.
Broader Restrictions on Aid
Reviving the global gag rule, which halts US aid to groups that provide, advocate for or advise on abortion services overseas, is commonplace under 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 October, the US announces it intends to broaden the scope of the policy to include governments and multilateral organisations in addition to NGOs, and to encompass equity and inclusion initiatives. More details on the broader enforcement are expected in early 2026. A expert in child welfare says broadening the policy will have “unimaginable effects”. Advocates for bodily autonomy fear that new US aid packages being discussed with African nations will become conditional on accepting the new, wider policy.
