Five Key Moments in the Rollback of the Freedoms of Women and Girls in 2025.
Twelve months prior, feminist advocacy groups were steeling themselves against a return of Donald Trump to office. The ensuing chaos was largely unforeseen. The volume and speed of White House mandates issued from the White House were viewed as a calculated strategy to induce a state of shock. This strategy had its intended impact – there was bewilderment, fury, and fatigue as agencies hastened to fill the gap left by a abrupt cessation of financial support. But that was just the beginning.
The US administration has been the key driver, supported by fervent lobbying efforts by ultra-conservative groups capitalizing on the climate to build worldwide connections with sympathetic regimes.
This opposition to progressive rights denotes an international coalition of government figures, churches, and advocacy collectives as well as ultra-rich backers and donors that aim to roll back advances on numerous fronts. These include access to termination, gay and trans protections, alternative households, and factual sexual instruction.
They do this by lobbying governments, supporting court cases, discrediting international efforts to advance equality, spreading disinformation, and funding non-profit organisations.
We look at five moments that impacted the safety, dignity and lives of girls and women.
The Dismantling of USAID
In March, six weeks after a key American development organization is frozen, causing international chaos, a top American diplomat announces that the lion's share of the organization's initiatives will be axed. Career diplomats, former presidents and aid and medical specialists condemn the news, predicting that lives will be lost. Activists say that the dismantling of this institution is more than a funding crisis, it is a savage attack on human rights and family planning and reproductive care. A multitude of agencies say females will bear the brunt by reduced funding, especially in war zones. As the year ends, evidence indicates 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. Two other major donor nations initiate similar reductions. A leader of an international advocacy group 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 Christian-right organisations meet in an high-end hotel in NYC for a biannual gathering held alongside the UN's flagship gender equality meeting. It is an forum to discuss methods on how to counter the UN's progressive policies. They are in optimistic frame of mind as they celebrate shifts in US policy on social issues and termination of pregnancy. Meanwhile, the head of the United Nations opens the gender equality forum with a somber alert that “the poison of patriarchy” is returning, after a study indicates that groups opposing progressive rights are actively undermining longstanding consensus on fundamental freedoms for women around the world.
Summits Promoting Conservative Norms
Over the warmer months, a cluster of meetings in Africa focused on the traditional family and national sovereignty sparks alarm among rights advocates. In early May, a president and first lady open a major forum to combat what they label external influences undermining local norms. A soon after, another regional summit on conservative ethics is held. Both events are attended by leading US and European anti-rights figures, including heads of influential networks. One speaker urges African NGOs to stand up to “worldwide progressive social restructuring” of global institutions. In the following month, a prominent church hosts a event focused on reinforcing families in the region, an event that health activists say has become a forum for opposing queer and trans rights. Advocates remark that the level of external participation has increased markedly.
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 July plans to destroy a significant cache of reproductive health commodities held in a European depot. A global sexual health network states that their incineration will prevent a huge female population from family planning options, 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 calculated move to control fertility”. A international emergency medical charity calls it “cruel and irresponsible”. Charities attempt to acquire the contraceptives so they can fulfill their original purpose, but the US declines every proposal. The situation remains unresolved as local authorities will not allow perfectly good supplies to be incinerated.
Broader Restrictions on Aid
Reinstating the Mexico City Policy, which halts US aid to groups that provide, advocate for or advise on abortion services overseas, is standard practice for 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 broaden the scope of the policy to include governments and multilateral organisations in addition to NGOs, and to include DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) projects. Further specifics about the broader enforcement are anticipated next year. A director of a major health partnership says extending the reach will have “catastrophic impacts”. Pro-choice activists fear that new US aid packages being discussed with African nations will become dependent on agreeing to the expanded global gag.
