Global 50/50’s latest research shows just how quickly this retreat on gender justice is unfolding. Research in 2025 found a 45% proportional decline in DEI-related workplace policies and a 22% decline in workplace gender equality policies among global health organisations receiving US federal funding between 2024 and 2025. In 2026, the expansion of the Mexico City Policy (also known as the 'global gag rule') marked a further escalation. Associated with well-documented harms, from clinic closures and loss of outreach programmes to increases in unintended pregnancies, this latest iteration represents a turning point for global health and development assistance: aid is moving from regulating specific activities to conditioning funding on alignment with a narrow worldview.
The inaugural event in Cambridge brings together two globally influential voices on gender, power and resistance:
- Laura Bates: Activist, writer and founder of the Everyday Sexism Project, which has collected over 200,000 testimonies of gender inequality worldwide. She is the bestselling author of nine books, including her latest, The New Age of Sexism: How the AI Revolution is Reinventing Misogyny.
- Raewyn Connell: Feminist sociologist and foundational scholar in the study of masculinities. She is the author of 24 books, including her most recent Trans Lives, and is Professor Emerita at the University of Sydney.
Moving beyond moral panic, the conversation will place today’s contestation on the concept of gender in historical context, explore how technology has supercharged misogyny and male-supremacist politics, and ask what it would mean for all people, institutions, and movements to actively support gender justice.
At a time when commitments are quietly being withdrawn, convening is strategic. This series reflects Global 50/50’s ongoing commitment to holding institutions accountable and advancing gender justice worldwide.
The event will be followed by a networking reception and a photo exhibit from This is Gender, visual storytelling initiative that mobilises imagery from around the world to reimagine gender justice.
