Five Defining Significant Developments in the Rollback of the Freedoms of Women and Girls in the Past Year.
Twelve months prior, groups dedicated to gender equality were steeling themselves against a new Trump administration. Hardly anyone anticipated. The flood and velocity of executive orders originating in the White House were viewed as a deliberate tactic to paralyze through overload. This strategy had its intended impact – there was confusion, anger and exhaustion as agencies hastened to compensate for the loss left by a major funding freeze. But the situation was about to worsen.
The American government has been the central catalyst, supported by relentless activism by ultra-conservative groups using the moment to strengthen global ties with sympathetic regimes.
The anti-rights movement refers to a global network of political leaders, religious institutions, civil society groups as well as ultra-rich backers and donors that aim to roll back progress across a wide spectrum of issues. These include reproductive choice, queer and transgender freedoms, diverse family models, and honest sex ed.
They pursue this agenda via lobbying governments, supporting court cases, discrediting international efforts to promote fairness, circulating falsehoods, and resourcing aligned NGOs.
We review five instances that affected the safety, dignity and lives of females globally.
USAID Effectively Dismantled
In March, six weeks after a prominent humanitarian funder is suspended, causing widespread distress, a top American diplomat states that over eighty percent of the organization's initiatives will be axed. Career diplomats, former presidents and aid and medical specialists condemn the news, cautioning that mortality will increase. Activists say that the dismantling of this institution is greater than a budgetary issue, it is a savage attack on human rights and access to contraception and reproductive health services. Many organisations say females will bear the brunt by reduced funding, especially in regions of instability. As the year ends, statistics reveal how hundreds of thousands of people have already died from disease, starvation, lack of access to maternal care and gender-based violence, with millions more to come. Additional key contributing countries announce their own austerity measures. A director of a global justice organization 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 the same month, several Christian-right organisations meet in an high-end hotel in NYC for a strategic summit held concurrently with 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 applaud new Washington directives on LGBTQ issues, inclusion, and reproductive rights. Meanwhile, the head of the United Nations opens the women’s summit with a stark warning that “the venom of male dominance” is returning, after a report shows that anti-rights actors are systematically eroding longstanding consensus on core aspects of gender equality around the world.
Summits Promoting Conservative Norms
Over the summer, a series of conferences in Africa centered on the conventional household and state autonomy triggers anxiety among equality campaigners. In the start of May, a national leader and spouse open a large assembly to resist what they label overseas agendas corrupting societal morals. A soon after, another Pan-African conference on traditional morals is held. Both events are graced by leading American and European conservative activists, including presidents of prominent organizations. One speaker calls on African NGOs to stand up to “international liberal agenda” of global institutions. In June, a major religious institution hosts a event focused on reinforcing families in West Africa, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become a stage for criticizing gender equality. Campaigners note that the level of external participation has expanded considerably.
Contraceptive Destruction Order
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 July plans to destroy a vast stockpile of birth control held in a European depot. A major reproductive health federation states that their destruction will deny a huge female population from contraceptive supplies, and lead to hundreds of thousands of unintended pregnancies and unsafe abortions. The organization labels the plan an ideological decision “about imposing an anti-rights agenda on the entire world” and “a deliberate form of reproductive oppression”. A international emergency medical charity calls it “callous and reckless”. Charities attempt to acquire the contraceptives so they can fulfill their original purpose, but the US refuses all offers. The situation remains in deadlock as the regional government will not allow perfectly good supplies to be incinerated.
‘Global Gag Rule’ Expanded
Reinstating the Mexico City Policy, which halts US aid to groups that provide, advocate for or advise on abortion services overseas, is commonplace under certain US administrations. It was anticipated when the policy was restored 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 include DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) projects. Further specifics about the expansion of the rule are anticipated next year. A leader in global maternal health says broadening the policy 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 new, wider policy.
