30 Years After the Beijing Declaration, Women’s Rights Face Global Backlash
Originally published by Cynthia Richie Terrell for Ms. Magazine
2025 is the 30th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, a landmark conference organized by the United Nations to encourage gender equality and empower women and girls across the globe. During this conference, over 17,000 delegates from 189 countries gathered together to create an actionable plan to improve outcomes for women and girls, eliminate violence, enact gender quotas in political representation, and improve women’s economic standing.
Last week, just before International Women’s Day, the United Nations released an update to that report: One in four countries saw backlash on women’s rights in 2024.
Data from the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) and U.N. Women show that “men outnumber women by more than three times in executive and legislative positions.” To be more specific, women serve as heads of state in only 25 countries, make up only 27.2 percent of Parliament, and hold 22.9 percent of Cabinet positions internationally.