Five Defining Key Moments in the Rollback of the Rights of Women and Girls in 2025.
Twelve months prior, feminist advocacy groups were anticipating a return of Donald Trump to office. Scarcely anyone expected. The flood and velocity of administrative decrees emanating from the White House were interpreted as a premeditated approach to paralyze through overload. To a large extent, it succeeded – there was bewilderment, fury, and fatigue as networks struggled to compensate for the loss left by a abrupt cessation of financial support. But this was only the precursor.
The US administration has been the central catalyst, aided by fervent lobbying efforts by deeply conservative factions capitalizing on the climate to forge international alliances with like-minded governments.
This opposition to progressive rights denotes an international coalition of elected officials, faith-based bodies, non-governmental organisations as well as wealthy philanthropists and dynasties that aim to roll back gains in a variety of areas. This covers reproductive choice, queer and transgender freedoms, diverse family models, and honest sex ed.
They pursue this agenda via influencing policymakers, funding litigation, undermining global initiatives to push for parity, disseminating propaganda, and supporting ideologically-matched groups.
We look at five moments that influenced the safety, dignity and lives of females globally.
The Dismantling of USAID
In early spring, six weeks after a major US aid agency is suspended, causing turmoil around the world, a top American diplomat states that a vast majority of the institution's work will be scrapped. Career diplomats, ex-presidents and aid and medical specialists condemn the news, stating that mortality will increase. Human rights advocates say that the dismantling of this institution is not just a financial shortfall, it is a vicious offensive against basic liberties and family planning and reproductive care. Many organisations say females will bear the brunt by waning support, especially in conflict areas. As the year ends, statistics reveal how a significant mortality toll has been exacted from illness, famine, inadequate obstetric services, and violence against women, with millions more to come. Additional key contributing countries proceed with parallel slashes. A director of a global justice organization says a choice to reduce international development funding is a gesture of alignment with another government's agenda.
Faith-Based Activists Mobilize at UN Conference
In the same month, several faith-based advocacy networks meet in an upmarket New York hotel for a two-day conference held in parallel with the annual UN Women gathering. It is an chance to exchange strategies on how to counter the UN's progressive policies. They are in optimistic frame of mind as they welcome new Washington directives on gender, diversity and abortion. Meanwhile, the UN secretary general opens the global conference with a grave caution that “the venom of male dominance” is back, after a study indicates that anti-rights actors are systematically eroding established norms on key women’s rights issues around the world.
African ‘Family Values’ Conferences
Over the warmer months, a cluster of meetings in Africa focused on the conservative family structures and national independence sparks alarm among human rights defenders. In May, a president and first lady open a major forum to resist what they label criminal foreign forces eroding traditional family values. 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 calls on African NGOs to push back against “international liberal agenda” of global institutions. In the following month, a major religious institution hosts a event focused on reinforcing families in an African nation, an event that health activists say has become a stage for criticizing gender equality. Campaigners note that the extent of foreign involvement has expanded considerably.
American Plan to Burn Birth Control
As health facilities across Africa report they are facing shortages of birth control, including emergency kits for survivors of sexual violence, the US announces in midsummer plans to incinerate a significant cache of reproductive health commodities held in a storage facility in Belgium. A major reproductive health federation states that their destruction will deny 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 “an intentional act of reproductive coercion”. A prominent medical humanitarian organization calls it “cruel and irresponsible”. Charities attempt to acquire the contraceptives so they can be distributed to those in need, but the US rejects each bid. The situation remains at a standstill as the regional government are blocking the destruction of viable medicines.
‘Global Gag Rule’ Expanded
Reviving the global gag rule, which halts US aid to groups that provide, advocate for or advise on abortion services overseas, is typical of certain US administrations. It was widely expected when the rule was reinstated 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 cover diversity programmes. Further specifics about the broader enforcement are expected in early 2026. A director of a major health partnership says widening the scope will have “unimaginable effects”. Advocates for bodily autonomy fear that upcoming Washington funding agreements being arranged with states on the continent will become contingent upon adopting the broadened restrictions.
