Five Major Pivotal Events in the Challenge to the Rights of Women and Girls in the Past Year.
This time last year, organisations advocating for women's rights were anticipating a second Trump term. Hardly anyone anticipated. The torrent and swiftness of White House mandates originating in the White House were interpreted as a premeditated approach to paralyze through overload. The tactic proved effective – there was confusion, anger and exhaustion as organisations scrambled to plug the hole left by a abrupt cessation of financial support. But this was only the precursor.
The Washington leadership has been the main instigator, aided by relentless activism by ultra-conservative groups exploiting the situation to build worldwide connections with ideological partners.
The movement against gender equality refers to a global network of elected officials, faith-based bodies, non-governmental organisations as well as wealthy philanthropists and dynasties that strive to weaken progress across a wide spectrum of issues. This covers pro-choice policies, equality for sexual minorities, gender identity recognition, and inclusive relationship teaching.
They pursue this agenda via advocating to officials, financing legal challenges, sabotaging multilateral work to promote fairness, circulating falsehoods, and resourcing aligned NGOs.
We review five episodes that shaped the welfare, autonomy, and survival of women and girls.
USAID Effectively Dismantled
In March, six weeks after a major US aid agency is its funds are blocked, causing turmoil around the world, a senior US official states that a vast majority of the institution's work will be scrapped. Career diplomats, former presidents and aid and medical specialists denounce the action, warning that mortality will increase. Activists say that the closure of the organization is greater than a budgetary issue, it is a vicious offensive against basic liberties and access to contraception and reproductive health services. Numerous groups say females will bear the brunt by waning support, 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. Another pair of leading funders announce their own austerity measures. 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 high-end hotel in NYC for a biannual gathering held concurrently with the annual UN Women gathering. It is an opportunity to share tactics on how to defeat the UN’s “radical agenda”. They are in optimistic frame of mind as they applaud changes in American foreign policy on gender, diversity and abortion. Meanwhile, the head of the United Nations opens the gender equality forum with a somber alert that “the poison of patriarchy” is resurgent, after a report shows that groups opposing progressive rights are actively undermining longstanding consensus on core aspects of gender equality around the world.
Summits Promoting Conservative Norms
Over the summer, a cluster of meetings in Africa themed around the traditional family and national sovereignty raises concerns among rights advocates. In early May, a head of state and partner open a large assembly 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 graced by leading US and European anti-rights figures, including presidents of prominent organizations. One speaker exhorts African NGOs to stand up to “international liberal agenda” of international organizations. In June, a major religious institution hosts a gathering about supporting traditional households in an African nation, an event that health activists say has become a forum for opposing queer and trans rights. Activists observe that the extent of foreign involvement has expanded considerably.
Contraceptive Destruction Order
As health facilities across Africa report they are depleting their stocks of family planning supplies, including prophylaxis for assault victims, the US announces in July plans to incinerate a vast stockpile of birth control held in a storage facility in Belgium. A global sexual health network states that their destruction will deny a huge female population from contraceptive supplies, and lead to a public health crisis of unwanted pregnancies. The organization labels the plan an politically-motivated move “about imposing an anti-rights agenda on the entire world” and “an intentional act of reproductive coercion”. A renowned doctors' group calls it “callous and reckless”. NGOs offer to buy the contraceptives so they can fulfill their original purpose, but the US rejects each bid. The situation remains at a standstill as local authorities refuse to permit the destruction of viable medicines.
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 typical of certain US administrations. It was widely expected when the policy was restored in the first month of the year. The administration also rejoined an international anti-abortion agreement. But in October, 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. Further specifics about the policy's widened application are anticipated next year. A expert in child welfare says broadening the policy will have “devastating consequences”. Advocates for bodily autonomy fear that fresh American assistance deals being discussed with African nations will become conditional on accepting the new, wider policy.
