Five Major Key Moments in the Challenge to the Rights of Women and Girls in This Past Year.

This time last year, women’s rights organisations were steeling themselves against a return of Donald Trump to office. Few were prepared for. The sheer number and rapid pace of executive orders emanating from the White House were viewed as a premeditated approach to cause confusion and fear. This strategy had its intended impact – there was bewilderment, fury, and fatigue as groups rushed to fill the gap left by a sudden aid suspension. But this merely marked the opening act.

The Trump administration has been the main instigator, bolstered by vigorous campaigning by deeply conservative factions capitalizing on the climate to strengthen global ties with ideological partners.

This opposition to progressive rights signifies a transnational grouping of political leaders, religious institutions, civil society groups as well as affluent financiers and clans that work to dismantle forward movement on multiple topics. This encompasses abortion, LGBTQ rights, trans rights, non-traditional family structures and comprehensive sexuality education.

They achieve this through influencing policymakers, funding litigation, undermining global initiatives to advance equality, spreading disinformation, and funding non-profit organisations.

We review five moments that influenced the security, respect, and well-being of girls and women.

The Demise of a Major Aid Agency

In the month of March, six weeks after a key American development organization is its funds are blocked, causing widespread distress, a senior US official confirms that a vast majority of the agency’s programmes will be eliminated. Career diplomats, former presidents and humanitarian and health experts decry the decision, predicting that people will die as a result. Rights defenders say that the closure of the organization is greater than a budgetary issue, it is a savage attack on human rights and family planning and reproductive care. Numerous groups say females will bear the brunt by waning support, especially in war zones. As the year ends, evidence indicates how a tremendous loss of life has already occurred from disease, starvation, lack of access to maternal care and gender-based violence, with many more millions at risk. 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 an attempt to placate a powerful partner.

Conservative Religious Groups Lobby at UN Women Meeting

In the same month, several conservative religious groups meet in an luxury Manhattan venue for a two-day conference held alongside the annual UN Women gathering. It is an opportunity to share tactics on how to oppose what they term a UN overreach. They are in high spirits as they welcome changes in American foreign policy on LGBTQ issues, inclusion, and reproductive rights. Meanwhile, the world's top diplomat opens the global conference with a stark warning that “the poison of patriarchy” is returning, after a study indicates that groups opposing progressive rights are systematically eroding longstanding consensus on fundamental freedoms for women around the world.

African ‘Family Values’ Conferences

Over the warmer months, a sequence of gatherings in Africa focused on the conventional household and state autonomy sparks alarm among rights advocates. In early May, a president and first lady open a large assembly to resist what they label criminal foreign forces eroding traditional family values. A shortly thereafter, another continental gathering on conservative ethics is held. Both events are attended by leading US and European anti-rights figures, including heads of influential networks. One speaker calls on African NGOs to push back against “radical global social engineering” of global institutions. In the following month, a prominent church hosts a event focused on reinforcing families in an African nation, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become a stage for criticizing gender equality. Campaigners note that the scale of their presence has grown significantly.

American Plan to Burn Birth Control

As clinics in sub-Saharan Africa report they are depleting their stocks of family planning supplies, including post-rape care packages, the US announces in midsummer 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 family planning options, and lead to hundreds of thousands of unintended pregnancies and unsafe abortions. The organization labels the plan an ideological decision “about exporting a regressive policy worldwide” and “a calculated move to control fertility”. 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 rejects each bid. The situation remains at a standstill as local authorities are blocking usable products to be destroyed.

Widening of the Anti-Abortion Policy

Reinstating the Mexico City Policy, which halts US aid to groups that offer, promote, or give information about abortion services overseas, is typical of certain US administrations. It was anticipated when the ban was reimposed in the first month of the year. The administration also reaffirmed membership in a pro-life declaration. But in the autumn, the US announces it intends to expand the global gag rule to include governments and multilateral organisations in addition to NGOs, and to cover diversity programmes. Additional information regarding the policy's widened application are likely forthcoming. A expert in child welfare says widening the scope will have “devastating consequences”. Advocates for bodily autonomy fear that new US aid packages being discussed with African nations will become contingent upon adopting the expanded global gag.