Five Critical Significant Developments in the Rollback of the Rights of Women and Girls in This Past Year.
Twelve months prior, women’s rights organisations were preparing for a Trump presidency sequel. Few were prepared for. The sheer number and rapid pace of presidential directives emanating from the White House were interpreted as a premeditated approach to paralyze through overload. The tactic proved effective – there was disarray, outrage, and weariness as agencies hastened to address the shortfall left by a major funding freeze. But this was only the precursor.
The Trump administration has been the main instigator, bolstered by relentless activism by religious fundamentalist networks seizing the opportunity to build worldwide connections with sympathetic regimes.
The anti-rights movement signifies a transnational grouping of elected officials, faith-based bodies, non-governmental organisations as well as wealthy philanthropists and dynasties that seek to undermine progress across a wide spectrum of issues. These include reproductive choice, queer and transgender freedoms, diverse family models, and honest sex ed.
They accomplish their goals by influencing policymakers, funding litigation, undermining global initiatives to foster equity, propagating misinformation, and bankrolling sympathetic charities.
We look at five moments that shaped the safety, dignity and lives of girls and women.
The Dismantling of USAID
In early spring, a month and a half following a major US aid agency is its funds are blocked, causing international chaos, a top American diplomat reveals that nearly all of the institution's work will be scrapped. Career diplomats, ex-presidents and relief and public health authorities criticize the move, cautioning that people will die as a result. Rights defenders say that the closure of the organization is more than a funding crisis, it is a savage attack on human rights and access to contraception and reproductive health services. A multitude of agencies say women and girls will be disproportionately affected by shrinking assistance, especially in regions of instability. As the year ends, data shows how a tremendous loss of life has already occurred from disease, starvation, lack of access to maternal care and gender-based violence, with a far greater catastrophe looming. Another pair of leading funders initiate similar reductions. A head of a worldwide campaign network says a choice to reduce international development funding is an attempt to placate a powerful partner.
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 two-day conference held alongside the international conference on women's rights. It is an forum to discuss methods on how to counter the UN's progressive policies. They are in optimistic frame of mind as they applaud changes in American foreign policy on social issues and termination of pregnancy. Meanwhile, the world's top diplomat opens the gender equality forum with a grave caution that “the venom of male dominance” is back, after a study indicates that groups opposing progressive rights are actively undermining established norms on core aspects of gender equality around the world.
African ‘Family Values’ Conferences
Over the summer, a sequence of gatherings in Africa themed around the conventional household and state autonomy raises concerns among equality campaigners. In early May, a president and first lady open a significant conference to combat what they label criminal foreign forces eroding traditional family values. A soon after, another regional summit on conservative ethics 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 stand up to “international liberal agenda” of multilateral bodies. In the following month, a major religious institution hosts a family strengthening conference in West Africa, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become an anti-LGBTQ, anti-gender platform. Activists observe that the extent of foreign involvement has increased markedly.
American Plan to Burn Birth Control
As clinics in sub-Saharan Africa report they are facing shortages of birth control, including emergency kits for survivors of sexual violence, the US announces in July plans to dispose of millions of dollars worth of contraceptives held in a storage facility in Belgium. A leading family planning organization states that their elimination will deprive countless females from contraceptive supplies, and lead to hundreds of thousands of unintended pregnancies and unsafe abortions. The organization labels the plan an dogmatic choice “about exporting a regressive policy worldwide” and “a deliberate form of reproductive oppression”. A renowned doctors' group calls it “cruel and irresponsible”. Aid groups propose purchasing the contraceptives so they can fulfill their original purpose, but the US refuses all offers. The situation remains unresolved as host nation officials refuse to permit perfectly good supplies to be incinerated.
Broader Restrictions on Aid
Bringing back the anti-abortion funding ban, which cuts American funding for groups that offer, promote, or give information about abortion services overseas, is standard practice for certain US administrations. It came as no surprise when the policy was restored in the first month of the year. The administration also reaffirmed membership in a pro-life declaration. 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. Additional information regarding the broader enforcement are anticipated next year. A leader in global maternal health says extending the reach will have “catastrophic impacts”. Pro-choice activists fear that new US aid packages being negotiated with countries in Africa will become contingent upon adopting the new, wider policy.
