Five Major Landmark Occurrences in the Erosion of the Freedoms of Women and Girls in This Past Year.
This time last year, groups dedicated to gender equality were preparing for a new Trump administration. Hardly anyone anticipated. The volume and speed of presidential directives coming out of the White House were viewed as a premeditated approach to overwhelm and create panic. To a large extent, it succeeded – there was confusion, anger and exhaustion as networks struggled to plug the hole left by a abrupt cessation of financial support. But this was only the precursor.
The American government has been the key driver, supported by vigorous campaigning by deeply conservative factions using the moment to forge international alliances with sympathetic regimes.
The anti-rights movement denotes an international coalition of government figures, churches, and advocacy collectives as well as affluent financiers and clans that aim to roll back forward movement on multiple topics. This encompasses reproductive choice, queer and transgender freedoms, diverse family models, and honest sex ed.
They pursue this agenda via advocating to officials, financing legal challenges, sabotaging multilateral work to foster equity, propagating misinformation, and bankrolling sympathetic charities.
We review five moments that influenced the security, respect, and well-being of women and girls.
USAID Dismantled
In March, a month and a half following a key American development organization is its funds are blocked, causing widespread distress, a senior US official announces that over eighty percent of the agency’s programmes will be eliminated. US diplomats, ex-presidents and humanitarian and health experts condemn the news, predicting that mortality will increase. Activists say that the demise of the agency is greater than a budgetary issue, it is a savage attack on human rights and family planning and reproductive care. A multitude of agencies say the impact on girls and women will be severe by shrinking assistance, especially in regions of instability. As the year ends, statistics reveal how hundreds of thousands of people have already died from illness, famine, inadequate obstetric services, and violence against women, with millions more to come. Two other major donor nations follow with their own cuts. A head of a worldwide campaign network says a decision to slash billions in overseas assistance is a move to appease a political ally.
Faith-Based Activists Mobilize at UN Conference
In March, several faith-based advocacy networks meet in an luxury Manhattan venue for a two-day conference held alongside the annual UN Women gathering. It is an chance to exchange strategies on how to oppose what they term a UN overreach. They are in optimistic frame of mind as they welcome shifts in US policy on LGBTQ issues, inclusion, and reproductive rights. Meanwhile, the head of the United Nations opens the gender equality forum with a stark warning that “the toxin of gendered hierarchy” is resurgent, after a report shows that anti-rights actors are actively undermining historic agreements on key women’s rights issues around the world.
Conferences on Traditional Values in Africa
Over the warmer months, a cluster of meetings in Africa centered on the conservative family structures and national independence sparks alarm among equality campaigners. In May, a national leader and spouse open a large assembly to resist what they label overseas agendas corrupting societal morals. A few days later, another regional summit on family values is held. Both events are graced by leading American and European conservative activists, including leaders of well-known groups. One speaker calls on African NGOs to resist “international liberal agenda” of multilateral bodies. In the following month, a prominent church hosts a event focused on reinforcing families in West Africa, an event that health activists say has become a stage for criticizing gender equality. Advocates remark that the extent of foreign involvement has increased markedly.
American Plan to Burn Birth Control
As medical centers in numerous African countries report they are facing shortages of birth control, including post-rape care packages, the US announces in midsummer plans to incinerate a significant cache of reproductive health commodities held in a storage facility in Belgium. A global sexual health network states that their elimination will deprive countless females from access to birth control, and lead to a surge in unplanned pregnancies and dangerous terminations. The organization labels the plan an politically-motivated move “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 declines every proposal. The situation remains unresolved as local authorities are blocking the destruction of viable medicines.
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 came as no surprise when the ban was reimposed in January. The administration also rejoined an international anti-abortion agreement. But in October, 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. More details on the expansion of the rule are anticipated next year. A director of a major health partnership says extending the reach will have “catastrophic impacts”. Pro-choice activists fear that upcoming Washington funding agreements being negotiated with countries in Africa will become dependent on agreeing to the broadened restrictions.
