From GGR Revocation to Dobbs – Understanding the Interconnected Challenges and Opportunities
January 28, 2024, marked three years since President Biden temporarily revoked through executive action the Global Gag Rule (GGR) — a dangerous anti-abortion policy that attaches strings to U.S. global health assistance to effectively “gag” organizations and halt all existing work providing, advocating for, counseling on, or providing referrals for abortion services as a method of family planning, even if those activities are funded by their own, non-U.S. funding.
While we welcome the revocation by President Biden three years ago, we know that since 1984 it has been enacted by every Republican president and revoked by every Democratic president. The only long-lasting solution is a permanent repeal. We join our allies in the reproductive justice movement to call on the US Congress to implement the Global Health, Empowerment, and Rights Act (Global HER Act) immediately to prevent a future president from unilaterally imposing the Global Gag Rule.
As a Global South-led alliance, we can’t help but to connect the dots between the growing assault on reproductive rights and abortion care within the United States, and the effects of US policies on sexual and reproductive health, rights and justice (SRHRJ) activism and service delivery outside of the United States. While the right to safe and legal abortion has now become contested territory within the United States, these domestic debates have been used with great efficacy by opponents of reproductive rights elsewhere.
After recent events such as the U.S. Supreme Court overturn of the long-standing precedent of a constitutional right to legal abortion via their ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization in 2022, public discourse once again was split between the two perceived camps of ‘pro-choice’ and ‘anti-choice’, and the implications of this action on women between 15-49 living within the US. However, less recognized is the fact that the ramifications were felt not only within the U.S. but also on reproductive justice movements globally.
We continue to watch on with grave disappointment as the attack on reproductive rights has gained more momentum. The U.S. Supreme Court is re-entering the abortion debate this year (2024), by agreeing to review a lower court decision that would make mifepristone, the commonly used abortion pill, less accessible. Even as policymakers and reproductive justice advocates are debating its likely impact domestically, it is imperative that the cascading global impacts are acknowledged and strategized for. The outcome of the case, when pronounced, is likely to have significant impacts on the availability of mifepristone, who can prescribe it and when it can be taken. However, in the meantime, anti-rights, and specifically anti-choice actors globally, are sure to make the most of the issue being discussed in the Supreme Court, and the lack of clarity on mifepristone us to hinder access for millions globally, much like we saw happen after the Dobbs decision was handed down.
The US occupies a unique role as the largest donor internationally and given the immense political and cultural power it can, and does, exert, US domestic policies have a significant impact on the global SRHRJ movement. We have witnessed that this decision emboldened attacks on bodily autonomy and abortion access across the globe, among specific regions and in specific countries.
This global impact was felt because of the actions and influence of several interconnected, strategic, and well-funded anti-rights movements, which is shown in our newly finalized research report “The Global Impact of the Dobbs Decision on Abortion Laws, Policies, Legislation, Narratives, and Movements: Findings from Colombia, India, Kenya, and Nigeria.”
Drawing from the experience of how the Mexico City Policy, or the global gag rule (GGR), which was strengthened under former President Trump (2017-2021), emboldened anti-rights groups and destabilized women’s rights movements, sexual and reproductive health, rights, and justice (SRHRJ) activists believed Dobbs could similarly affect important global health funding. These immediate concerns in the wake of Dobbs prevented partnerships and alliance-building as some civil society organizations distanced themselves from pro-choice groups.
Our research report “Chaos Continues: The 2021 Revocation of the Global Gag Rule and The Need for Permanent Repeal,” also showed that given these worries and the lack of clear communication from the Biden administration when they revoked the GGR, organizations spent significant time and resources oscillating between ensuring compliance to policies such as GGR (during U.S. Republican presidential administrations), and then going back to baseline guarantees of rights when it was revoked (under U.S. Democratic presidential administrations), rather than making significant advances in SRHRJ.
All these stories show how the need has grown for the U.S. government to be especially cognizant of the global impact of their policy actions. Future action must move along several parallel paths.:
First, proactive policies that ensure SRHRJ are respected, protected, and fulfilled must be put in place to mitigate the damage from past policies. This will in turn generate long overdue advancements in integrated service delivery and the promotion of sexual and reproductive health. Additionally, there must be clear communication, guidance, and compliance mechanisms to monitor the implementation of such policies domestically and globally. It is clear from our research that, in the long run, this would lead to more efficient use of U.S. global health funding for program implementation within the current federal budget.
Second, there needs to be accountability for actions that the U.S. government takes, since their global power means that even so-called domestic actions have global impacts. Fòs Feminista’s SRHR Index provides evidence to support this. For example, in our 2021 grades for the U.S. Government, we note the impact that incomplete or poor communication around the Global Gag Rule had a significant negative impact of the grades earned by actors such as the Department of State. In 2022, we still see the lingering effects of such communication in the form of self-censoring by grantee organizations. By calling out how U.S. foreign policy decisions such as the GGR impact global health funding, Fòs looks to hold the U.S. government accountable for decisions that it makes. However, this is not enough. Now more than ever, the global feminist movements, especially those organizing around SRHRJ, need each other. We need to work with our feminist siblings in the United States to institute a long-term and comprehensive approach to holding U.S. policymakers accounting for their actions domestically and its global impacts.
Finally, while we are appalled by developments in domestic policy in the United States, it presents an opportunity for new leadership from the Global South to emerge. These new voices can build commitments to SRHRJ access and commodities that are insulated from shocks such as these coming from the Global North. This is also an opportunity to decolonize the SRHRJ field, to set our own priorities and be proactive rather than reactive to the challenges and issues handed down.
Fadekemi Akinfaderin
Lead Global Advocacy for Change
Swetha Sridhar
Senior Global Policy Research Officer
