The United Nations’ new “Gender Snapshot” report launched at the UN General Assembly last month revealed that not a single Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) indicator under SDG 5—gender equality—has been fully achieved. While there has been progress in some areas of gender equality, this is a stark reminder that there is much work still to be done to achieve a gender-equal world. Yet those looking to advance gender equality face a major obstacle: a growing movement seeking not only to block further progress but to reverse previous gains.
Although contestation of women’s rights is not new, the nature of it is changing and accelerating with the advance of a stronger conservative anti-rights and anti-gender movement. This movement has been gaining ground by forming diverse and unusual alliances that are increasingly well-organized and well-funded. These coalitions are implementing strategies to oppose the rights of women and LGBTQI+ people and undermine the international consensus on women’s rights in multilateral arenas such as the United Nations in a process known as norm-spoiling.
Recent research by ODI highlights how anti-rights and anti-gender actors aim to weaken long-standing international commitments, resolutions, declarations, policies, and plans for gender equality action such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), and the 1995 Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action. With the anti-rights and anti-gender movement seeking to advance at the UN, feminist activists are fighting the backlash and defending existing rights, making it even more difficult to bring about positive change for gender equality in new areas.
Anti-rights Strategies in International Arenas
Well-coordinated transnational networks employ an array of tactics, both at the national level and in international governance arenas. Many of them have resources that outstrip those of the feminist movement. Tactics include overt strategies, such as visible anti-gender protests at the annual Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) and the use of media platforms such as CitizenGo to reach global audiences. They also include less visible tactics that are more difficult to counteract, such as behind-the-scenes lobbying of member-state delegates.
Whether overt or covert, these strategies aim to change the discourse around women’s rights to stop the diffusion of gender equality norms. Anti-gender activists often co-opt the language of human rights and development to push back against women’s rights. For example, they use language around “natural rights, family rights and the right to life of the unborn” to undermine women’s sexual and reproductive health rights in international arenas and to undermine and roll back laws on abortion rights or protections for LGBTQI+ people at the national and local levels.
The anti-gender movement has also developed a growing infrastructure to disseminate and lend intellectual credentials to anti-rights claims. Anti-gender activists have established “think tanks” such as the Family Research Council, published peer-reviewed articles, and hosted webinars, conferences, workshops, and roundtables. These mechanisms have helped the anti-rights agenda gain mainstream public and political support.
Strategies for Countering the Anti-rights Movement
In the face of this anti-gender backlash and the weakening of the international consensus on women’s rights, feminist activists find themselves working in an increasingly challenging and threatening environment. The civic spaces in which they work are shrinking, and they face broader anti-rights political environments. Nonetheless, international feminist activists are pursuing several strategies to proactively defend women’s rights, disrupt the expanding influence of the anti-gender movement, and promote new positive change in multilateral spaces.
First, they are focusing on mobilizing funding and resources for women’s rights and LGBTQI+ organizations. These organizations remain severely underfunded, especially compared to some of the well-funded organizations in the anti-rights movement. This inhibits their efforts to convene, meet, and strategize internationally. Feminist organizations such as Mama Cash, Women’s Fund Asia, and the Global Philanthropy Project, as well as UN entities such as UN Women are seeking ways to increase funding, improve the quality of funding, and mobilize resources to counter the anti-rights movement both directly and indirectly. Ultimately, it will be up to donors to allocate more and better funding and resources to feminist organizations, including multi-donor, multi-year funding modalities.
Second, organizations are strengthening inclusive transnational alliances and networks that are also representative of diverse groups, such as the LGBTQI+ community. These networks may include not only civil society organizations but also individual champions, multilateral institutions, and allied governments. Examples include SheDecides, the African Women’s Development and Communications Network (FEMNET), the Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development (APWLD), the Alliance for Feminist Movements, and the Action Coalitions as part of the Generation Equality Forum.
Third, organizations are seeking to generate more robust evidence and data on the roles, strategies, and impact of anti-rights coalitions at the international level to understand where, how, and why anti-gender ideas are taking hold. Women’s rights organizations are also increasingly documenting good practices for countering backlash and working to identify creative ways to counter anti-rights narratives at the national and global levels. Examples include Open Democracy’s “Tracking the Backlash” Project 50.50, which investigates anti-rights activities; the Observatory on the Universality of Rights coordinated by the Association for Women’s Rights in Development; the UN Working Group on Discrimination Against Women and Girls, which produces annual reports to the Human Rights Council; and the Gender and Development Network. Feminist organizations and their allies can then use this data to call out anti-gender tactics and develop counternarratives.
Fourth, with shrinking civic spaces in which to organize, the feminist movement is finding ways to share resources, convene meetings, and organize conferences among diverse women’s rights constituencies. Such spaces can allow for dialogue on differences within the women’s rights movement and are critical to developing new ways to generate and allocate funding for women’s rights organizations and build transnational, cross-sectoral, and diverse alliances that draw on the knowledge and activities of national and local movements. For example, the NGO Women Deliver organizes a large global conference every three years to convene thousands of stakeholders, advocates, and activists to share ideas and generate action on gender equality.
Finally, directly advocating at the UN remains an important part of efforts to counter the anti-gender backlash. Despite the challenging environment at CSW and other UN spaces, these fora provide opportunities for women’s rights activists to convene, advocate, and lobby governments. To realize these opportunities, feminist organizations need to create and strengthen alliances with “gender-friendly” states. This is particularly important for contributing to the language of resolutions in both New York and Geneva.
Despite operating in an increasingly challenging environment, the international feminist movement is actively working to counter anti-gender backlash and its impact. Although they face limited funding, shrinking civic spaces, and broader anti-rights political environments, feminist activists are mobilizing transnational networks and bringing together actors at the local, national, and global levels, along with communicating and raising awareness of norm-spoiling. To make substantial progress on gender equality, the international community—donors, government allies, and feminist organizations—must strategically work together to protect global gender equality norms while continuing to push for inclusive rights for all.
Rebecca Holmes is Research Associate at ODI. This article draws on an ODI briefing note (2024).