Five Critical Significant Developments in the Erosion of the Rights of Females in the Year 2025.
A year ago, organisations advocating for women's rights were anticipating a Trump presidency sequel. The ensuing chaos was largely unforeseen. The flood and velocity of presidential directives emanating from the White House were interpreted as a calculated strategy to paralyze through overload. To a large extent, it succeeded – there was confusion, anger and exhaustion as agencies hastened to fill the gap left by a sudden aid suspension. But that was just the beginning.
The US administration has been the main instigator, aided by relentless activism by ultra-conservative groups seizing the opportunity to forge international alliances with sympathetic regimes.
The anti-rights movement denotes an international coalition of policymakers, doctrinal establishments, and activist outfits as well as billionaire families and individuals that aim to roll back progress across a wide spectrum of issues. This encompasses abortion, LGBTQ rights, trans rights, non-traditional family structures and comprehensive sexuality education.
They do this by lobbying governments, supporting court cases, discrediting international efforts to promote fairness, circulating falsehoods, and resourcing aligned NGOs.
We look at five moments that impacted the welfare, autonomy, and survival of women and girls.
USAID Dismantled
In March, six weeks after a prominent humanitarian funder is its funds are blocked, causing global disruption, a top American diplomat reveals that a vast majority of the body's projects will be terminated. US diplomats, past leaders and humanitarian and health experts decry the decision, warning that fatalities will ensue. Human rights advocates say that the dismantling of this institution is greater than a budgetary issue, it is a brutal assault on fundamental freedoms and access to contraception and reproductive health services. Many organisations say females will bear the brunt by reduced funding, especially in war zones. As the year ends, evidence indicates how hundreds of thousands of people have already died from sickness, hunger, poor pregnancy healthcare, and abuse targeting females, with a far greater catastrophe looming. Two other major donor nations follow with their own cuts. A director of a global justice organization says a move to cut foreign aid drastically is a move to appease a political ally.
Conservative Religious Groups Lobby at UN Women Meeting
In March, several conservative religious groups meet in an luxury Manhattan venue for a strategic summit held concurrently with the annual UN Women gathering. It is an chance to exchange strategies on how to defeat the UN’s “radical agenda”. They are in high spirits as they celebrate changes in American foreign 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 returning, after a report shows that groups opposing progressive rights are systematically eroding established norms on key women’s rights issues around the world.
Conferences on Traditional Values in Africa
Over the summer, a cluster of meetings in Africa themed around the conventional household and state autonomy triggers anxiety among human rights defenders. In early May, a president and first lady open a major forum to combat what they label criminal foreign forces eroding traditional family values. A soon after, another Pan-African conference on traditional morals is held. Both events are attended by leading US and European anti-rights figures, including presidents of prominent organizations. One speaker exhorts African NGOs to resist “radical global social engineering” of international organizations. In the following month, a prominent church hosts a event focused on reinforcing families in the region, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become an anti-LGBTQ, anti-gender platform. Activists observe that the scale of their presence has increased markedly.
US Threat to Destroy Contraceptives
As medical centers in numerous African countries report they are facing shortages of birth control, including prophylaxis for assault victims, the US announces in July plans to incinerate a significant cache of reproductive health commodities held in a storage facility in Belgium. A global sexual health network states that their elimination will deprive a huge female population from family planning options, and lead to hundreds of thousands of unintended pregnancies and unsafe abortions. The organization labels the plan an politically-motivated move “about imposing an anti-rights agenda on the entire world” 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 refuses all offers. The situation remains in deadlock as local authorities are blocking the destruction of viable medicines.
Widening of the Anti-Abortion Policy
Reviving the global gag rule, which cuts American funding for groups that offer, promote, or give information about abortion services overseas, is commonplace under certain US administrations. It was anticipated when the policy was restored in the first month of the year. The administration also reaffirmed membership in a pro-life declaration. 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. Additional information regarding the broader enforcement 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 arranged with states on the continent will become conditional on accepting the expanded global gag.
