The Cycle Connecting Funding Cuts, Shrinking Civic Space and Rollback 

Across convenings and conferences, there were very few rooms where speakers or audience members didn’t bring up the impacts of sectoral funding cuts, shrinking civic space and backlash on women’s rights and gender equality. These challenges were spotlighted in almost every discussion. And yet, in those spaces I kept feeling that we were talking about these issues alongside one another, but not always talking about them in relation to one another. 

There is a tendency to analyze funding cuts, civic space and backlash in isolation as separate challenges. The reality is that they are deeply interconnected and cyclical. They feed into one another. Backlash against gender equality or women’s rights activists is not just about directly denying women and marginalized populations their rights, but it is about shrinking civic space by excluding women from decision-making through funding cuts. The combination of these tactics contributes to the rollback of women’s rights that we have seen globally, and they also reinforce one another, making it harder to reinstate, protect or uphold those rights. By perpetuating funding cuts, or redirecting resources towards military spending, and continuing to shrink civic space, leaders hear from fewer women and feminists about their experiences of rights infringement or conflict, and are even less exposed to the solutions they can offer to global challenges. 

So how does that cycle begin? In our work, as discussed in our own panel event at Women Deliver, “WPS in the face of backlash”, we hear and witness the impacts of increased military spending. We know that greater investment in war does not lead to long‑term peace and security for women living in conflict‑affected contexts. But what is often less visible is how those increases in military spending are directly linked to cuts in development funding that contribute to shrinking civic space. 

When development funding is cut, women’s rights organizations and feminist movements are forced into really difficult decisions about how to allocate increasingly limited resources. Funding is first allocated to keeping organizations alive and operational. To keeping essential services running. To keeping sexual and reproductive health services and supplies available and accessible. To keeping health centers, training centers, psychosocial services, and safe houses open. To keeping livelihood programs and village savings and loans associations that provide families with vital economic security afloat. And when those choices are forced, funding for advocacy, for convenings, for conferences, is often cut or at least deprioritized. 

In practice, that means delegations to diplomatic, policy, and finance spaces get slimmer. It means that women like me, who have a British passport, non-marginalized identity, and relatively easy visa access, are more able to attend conferences, trainings, and high-level meetings. And it means that – ultimately - representation in these rooms does not always reflect the diversity of women’s rights movements, or the diversity of women who are actually living and working within these crises. 

We have seen this painfully clearly even within our own organization. My colleague from Palestine was unable to attend Women Deliver because her visa did not come through in time. She was not here to speak about the reality of occupation in the West Bank, or about what our partners are experiencing in Gaza. We are seeing the same thing at UN convenings and open debates or capital-level inquiries and briefings: many women’s rights leaders are denied entry to the US based on their nationality, and funding cuts limit the diversity of participation that we’ve seen in previous years. And so, when we talk about shrinking civic space, it is not just about spaces closing, though that is happening too. It is also about seats being left empty. Seats that should be filled by women living in conflict and post-conflict communities, women who should be represented significantly at conferences and convenings that are shaping decisions that impact their lives. And when those seats are empty, they are often filled by other actors with less or different expertise, or who are unable to elevate and represent the challenges women face in war and crisis, not least due to the rollback of women’s rights in conflict-affected contexts. 

Empty spaces and unheard voices matter. Because it means that decision makers may technically be in the room. Doors may technically be open. But women with direct experience, expertise and policy insights from conflict-affected contexts cannot access them. Women are unable to speak directly about how increases in military funding are affecting their lives. Decision makers are not held to account with enough urgency for their choices that prioritize military spending over solutions that actually build long-term, inclusive peace and lay a foundation for future development. 

And so, the cycle continues, and the same decisions are made to increase military funding, which continues to lead to decreased development funding. That leads to advocacy and convening being deprioritized, which leads to narrower representation in global spaces, which leads once again to weaker accountability. And suddenly we are back where we started, with further policy, finance, and security decisions that prioritize militarization at the expense of women’s rights, peace, and gender equality. 

This is a cycle we will continue to see play out in decision-making spaces, convenings, and conferences across the world if we do not name it clearly and challenge it directly. And if we do not take accessibility seriously, not as a logistical issue, but as a political one.