The rise of a global anti-rights movement is threatening sexual and reproductive health and rights—as well as liberal democracies and the civil liberties and human rights of all.
For over 10 years, Ipas has been working to counter anti-rights efforts by tracking transnational trends and strategically sharing information with partners, media, researchers and allies. Our goal: To debunk the anti-rights agenda and drive action to help protect human rights for everyone.
Newest publications:
2024
Mission Creep: Expanding attacks on gender threaten the United Nations
United Nations spaces are increasingly addressing gender inequality in human rights and international development to promote equity. Accordingly, the anti-gender movement is advancing in UN spaces.
Report forthcoming, but Executive Summary available now.
2024
Protego is a project of the Institute of Women’s Health, which is led by former Trump administration official Valerie Huber. Protego is designed to operationalize the non-binding, anti-abortion Geneva Consensus Declaration (GCD), which was created in 2020 by Huber under the Trump administration. Protego aims to supplant science-based, rights-respecting education, health, and foreign policy. Piloted in Guatemala in 2023 and formally launched in Uganda in February 2024, Protego is a threat to existing international human rights frameworks.
2023
The Political Network for Values: Global far-right at the United Nations
On November 17, 2023, a gathering was hosted at the United Nation’s New York City headquarters by the Political Network for Values (PNfV), a major organizing nexus for the global far-right. The global human rights community must critically examine PNfV’s role as a far-right organizer and pay serious attention to the ideologies and actions of its members, sponsors, and strategic partners.
2023
Pulling Back the Cover: The Roots, Relationships and Rise of Family Watch International
This report aims to shed light on FWI, a group that peddles disinformation and homophobia that is impacting health, education, and human rights policy from Arizona to East Africa and in multilateral spaces like the United Nations.
We’re sharing the truth
Anti-rights actors are undermining gender justice, LGBTQ+ rights and access to sexual and reproductive health and rights, including abortion. These actors are diverse and well-connected, and work across religious denominations, political affiliations, and geographies in ways that are often hard to track or recognize.
That’s why we offer a range of research and reports that expose the agendas and harmful global impacts of anti-rights actors. Please explore our research and resources and share widely.
Ipas research and reports
2023
Out of Bounds: Foreign and digital influence targeting LGBTI Rights in Ghana
This report details connections between Ghanaian leaders and conservative foreign groups, showing how anti-LGBTI rhetoric, and social and other media traffic, are being shaped and driven by these interests. This report also provides recommendations to continue exposing the origins of anti-LGBTI hatred in Ghana and guidance on supporting LGBTI rights and reclaiming the narrative from homophobic politicians and other personalities.
2023
False Pretenses: The anti-comprehensive sexuality education agenda weaponizing human rights
Despite the proven positive impact of comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) on the sexual and reproductive health and rights of adolescents, there is a growing movement opposed to the curricula based on moral or religious grounds. This report outlines the main anti-CSE actors and how they link to each other, UN member states, and other global, regional, and national anti-rights and anti-gender trends. It also highlights how the anti-CSE movement seeks to destabilize a pedagogical tool developed in partnership with families, teachers, and governments.
2022
Anti-rights groups take aim at transnational trade agreement
Three anti-rights groups based in the global north are leading an attack on the ACP-EU Partnership Agreement—the governing system of development cooperation for aid and trade between the European Union (EU) and the African, Caribbean, and Pacific (ACP) group of states.
2022
Slide to Christian Nationalism: CPAC’s global expansion into Mexico
The U.S.-based Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), well known as a nexus for right-wing activism, is holding its first forum in Mexico. This brief for anyone interested in the global anti-rights movement provides an overview of CPAC’s background and international expansion, with a focus on how CPAC is collaborating with far-right actors in Mexico to advance its Christian nationalist agenda.
In the media
Ugandan President Signs Anti-Gay Law That Includes Death Penalty as a Punishment
“The passage of this bill has implications beyond LGBTQ rights. By trampling on human rights and constitutional law, this bill is a political project for authoritarianism.” — Gillian Kane, Ipas senior analyst
Where Democracy Falters, So Do Reproductive Rights
Undermining reproductive rights in one country, especially one as influential as the United States, often has ripple effects. U.S. administrations have for decades swung back and forth on funding family planning around the world, depending on their party line, while American anti-abortion groups look to wield influence far and wide. “Anti-rights organizations are global institutions,” says Dr. Anu Kumar, Ipas’s President and CEO in Foreign Policy.
How a Spanish right-wing group incited a moral storm in Kenya
Dr Angela Akol, the director of the Ipas Africa Alliance—which aims to end preventable deaths and disabilities from unsafe abortions—said the Mozilla Foundation’s report “demonstrates how quickly misinformation on important public health issues spreads and confirms that the anti-abortion movement in Kenya is fueled by overseas organizations. These are dangerous tactics and only serve to harm women.
‘Traditional Values’ Unite Both Sides in a New Ideological Cold War
There is much debate about a new “cold war” between Russia and the U.S., but one tactic illiberal politicians on both sides of the Atlantic agree on is embracing “traditional values” to cover up their own failings. Far-right demagogues from Moscow to Texas increasingly incite moral panic to stir up tensions and deflect from domestic troubles, writes Gillian Kane, senor policy advisor for Ipas.
Read more
Who are right-wing forces that attacked Georgia’s LGBTIQ+ ? in EU Obserer
The Mission Field Hospital in Political Research Associates
Attacks on women’s ministries are a threat to democracy in Open Democracy