A look at USAID's replacement for 'terrible' gender policy

During the waning days of Donald Trump’s presidency, his administration released a policy on gender and women’s empowerment meant to guide the U.S. Agency for International Development in its spending and program development. But the controversial policy was attacked as vague, politicized, discriminatory, and for eliminating mention of LGBTQ people. For the past two years the policy has been largely gathering dust, outside sources say. But the agency run by Samantha Power now has a new draft policy to replace the version drawn up during the Trump era. And in many ways, it reverses what critics described as a politically motivated policy that is “anti gender” and a “dangerous setback” to gender equality efforts. The 2020 policy immediately faced blowback, but with good reason, say critics. It was just “too terrible to let live,” Gayatri Patel, the vice president of advocacy and external relations at the Women’s Refugee Commission, told Devex. Some advocates worry the policy will continue to be politicized and change subject to the political party in office, rather than being updated based on evolving best practices. Among issues that concerned advocates was wording that stuck to a binary view of gender, entirely leaving out LGBTQ individuals, and failing to base the text on best practices in the sector, including in health programs. It also avoided internationally accepted language about human rights, experts told Devex. It appears USAID never truly implemented the policy and has been using other internal guidance and following requirements in legislation related to women’s entrepreneurship and economic empowerment, outside experts said. The agency declined to comment specifically about the issue. Once finalized and approved, the new policy “will provide a roadmap that informs and advances USAID’s commitment and effort to double our gender work,” a USAID spokesperson said without specifying when the final policy would be released. President Joe Biden has placed gender front and center, committing a record $2.6 billion to advance equity and equality in foreign assistance for the fiscal year 2023 — more than double current funding. It remains to be seen whether this will be new money or if Congress will approve sufficient funds to follow through on the commitment. The new policy would update the framework for USAID operations and programs to integrate gender equality and women’s empowerment across all of its work. It would also require that designated gender advisers spend at least 75% of their time working on gender issues and set a one-year deadline for all missions to appoint a gender adviser. “To folks outside, such a bureaucratic document is not a big deal, but within USAID it’s foundational to how they conceptualize gender, operate around gender, program around gender,” Patel said, adding, “It’s important to get it right.” Key changes The new policy is a 180-degree change from the previous one, Patel said, adding that it is “heartening to see” that many of the recommendations provided in response to the Trump-era policy have been addressed in the overhaul. Among the most notable changes are related to LGBTQ rights and sexual and reproductive health, including adding language about contraceptives and family planning. The policy is also grounded in evidence and is generally more inclusive, Patel said. While some of the language is similar to the 2020 version that was officially rolled out shortly before Trump left office, the new draft includes gender-diverse individuals and discusses the importance of access to education and health care and to other rights including owning assets. The latest draft has clear definitions of key terms including gender, gender identity, and gender-based violence. It says a person’s “gender identity may or may not align with their biological sex assigned at birth” and discusses a “spectrum” of identity. “The 2020 policy was really out of step with international norms,” and didn’t reflect best practices in gender definitions, despite attempts from career staff at USAID to keep it from being harmful, said Beirne Roose-Snyder, a senior policy fellow at the Center for Global Equality. U.S. policies have historically adhered to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, but the Trump-era policy chose instead to use a new “inalienable rights” framework that more narrowly defines human rights and excludes some internationally recognized rights, including reproductive and LGBTQ rights and deprioritizes others such as the rights to housing, health, education, and work. The Trump administration had an inalienable rights commission focused on trying to redefine human rights. The new draft policy by contrast clearly states that gender equality is a human right — in bold — near the beginning of the document. That inalienable rights framework is “anti-rights” because it ignores globally recognized norms and excludes or wrongly tries to create a hierarchy of rights. Using it in the gender policy was a “radical departure,” Roose-Snyder told Devex. This latest draft brings USAID gender policy “back to center” versus the 2020 version. It’s very important to “formalize” and “normalize” rights, as this policy does, especially following efforts to the contrary in the previous administration, she added. The new policy has language about the role of youth, has more about male engagement on gender equality than in the past, and is the first USAID gender policy to recognize online harassment and abuse as a major problem, said Justin Fugle, the head of policy at Plan International USA. Language on child marriage, menstrual hygiene, sexual and reproductive health, and girls in emergency settings is also new in this version. In many cases, these issues were not even mentioned in the 2020 strategy. “The 2020 strategy was pretty ideological and this one would be perceived by some to be ideological, but I think it is more evidence-based than anything else,” Fugle said. What could be better There are a few areas where the policy stopped short of what some advocates would have liked, they told Devex. The policy often refers to gender-diverse communities, rather than LGBTQI individuals, which is how the community would prefer to be acknowledged. And while the policy talks about sexual and reproductive health, it doesn’t talk about the associated rights, including the ability to make free and informed choices and have control over their health and lives, which is “not strong enough,” Fugle said. The draft could also include stronger requirements for staff training so they can think about how different people — be they women, children, or those with intersecting identities — can access and engage with development and humanitarian programs. While some training is mentioned in the draft, it is too discretionary and should be mandatory, Roose-Snyder said. Another area some would like to see strengthened is the accountability mechanisms, including a beefed-up ability to track funding for gender equality programs so it’s clear if the administration is meeting the $2.6 billion funding commitment. While this new policy lays out some important changes, “those resources are important to make it real, otherwise, it is a policy without much life in it,” Fugle said. Political tension In the past, USAID’s gender policy has lasted for many years and has not necessarily changed when political power changes hands. There is now some concern that it could become a sort of political football changing based on the party in power and not simply updated periodically as data and best practices change. Patel said she could see a lot of “restraint attempts” in the draft to make it a policy that could outlive a single administration. Having long-term policies is important because projects are often yearslong and staff needs stability to run programs and effectively make investments, she said. In fact, a significant amount of the new draft policies’ text is borrowed from the 2020 policy, preserving elements that were technically sound and evidence-based, experts told Devex. “There’s a real danger that gender equality has become a political issue. I think they’ve tried in this version a number of times to stay in the center rather than going as progressive as some in the community would like to see,” Fugle said.