UN warns that a deliberate political retreat from gender equality is reversing decades of progress by UN Women, agencies   Sep. 2026   One in three institutions built to advance gender equality stripped of power in last two years. The UN warns that a deliberate political retreat from gender equality is reversing decades of progress.   The Gender Snapshot 2026 report, released by UN Women and the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA), shows that where women hold real power, outcomes improve across every dimension of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development – from peace to education, and from poverty to climate action.   Yet the very institutions built over decades to advance gender equality are being systematically weakened, stalling or reversing progress at precisely the moment when the world cannot afford to go backwards.   The findings of the Gender Snapshot 2026 report reveal a political retreat from gender equality that is crosscutting, measurable, and compounding.   One in three institutional mechanisms for gender equality has had its institutional power eroded over the past two years. Around one in four have seen their operating budgets cut over the same period, and nearly one in 10 have lost control of their budget altogether.   Funding for gender equality has fallen to its lowest level since 2021, with funding for women’s rights organizations most impacted. Meanwhile, amid funding cuts, 42 per cent of UN entities report a weakening of their gender equality efforts.   The concentration of political power remains stark: Six in seven countries are led by men. Women continue to face systemic barriers at every stage. In some countries, as many as eight in 10 women running for office face violence in public life. And when women do reach cabinet, they are still disproportionately steered away from the portfolios that command economic power.   Yet, the 2026 Gender Snapshot report shows that, historically, in countries where women hold more than 20 per cent of parliamentary seats, immunization rates run up to 12 percentage points higher, and more children survive past early childhood than in countries with lower shares in parliament.   This tracks with what women in power tend to prioritize: They raised gender equality as an issue nearly three times as often as men at the United Nations General Assembly in 2025. They consistently push harder on care, health, and social protection issues like parental leave, unpaid care work, pension and savings, and workers’ protection and safety.   Boards with more women are more likely to adopt sustainability practices – cutting emissions, energy use, and water waste.   As women continue to face barriers to equal participation and influence, decades of political and legal gains on gender equality are increasingly being contested and, in some cases, dismantled.   Not one single indicator on the Sustainable Development Goal for gender equality (SDG 5) is on track to be met by 2030.   “The evidence is clear: When women lead, societies are stronger, economies are more resilient and outcomes are better for everyone. Yet as long as power remains concentrated in institutions that systematically exclude women, societies will continue to fall short of their full potential. Equality cannot be achieved without equal access to power – because equality without power is not equality at all”, said UN Women Executive Director Sima Bahous.   The pattern extends beyond government. Women hold only six per cent of corporate Chief Executive Officer positions globally and lead fewer than 20 per cent of the highest courts, leaving the decisions shaping business, law, employment, and the global economy overwhelmingly in the hands of men.   The report underlines that no vision for the future of the world is credible without women and girls having an equal share of power in shaping it.   UN Women is calling for a reversal of the political retreat on gender equality – and for power to be shared more equally.   That means ensuring women have an equal voice in political and economic decisions, properly funding gender equality institutions, protecting women’s rights organizations and civic space, and ensuring women have equal power to shape the decisions that affect economies, peace and security, technology, and public life.   Millions of women continue to endure some extremely severe forms of violence and discrimination across the globe. Nearly one in three women globally have survived partner or sexual violence in their lifetime, and in the past 12 months alone, 316 million women experienced physical or sexual violence by an intimate partner.   Nearly one in five girls is married before the age of 18, and an estimated 230 million women and girls worldwide are survivors of female genital mutilation.   The report finds that not a single country has achieved full legal equality, and 51 per cent of the 131 countries studied still have significant legal gaps.   Nearly two thirds of countries provide no or little legal protection for women’s land rights, creating significant barriers to land ownership and secure tenure. Fewer than 30 per cent of nations studied ensure joint land registration or women’s participation in land governance.   * The Gender Snapshot report is the world’s leading source of data on gender equality and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. It tracks progress for women and girls across all 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).   http://www.unwomen.org/en/digital-library/publications/2026/09/progress-on-the-sustainable-development-goals-the-gender-snapshot-2026 http://news.un.org/en/story/2026/09/1168360   * UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, General recommendation No. 40 (2024) on the equal and inclusive representation of women in decision-making systems: http://docs.un.org/en/CEDAW/C/GC/40 Visit the related web page
	Gloria Steinem: A voice for women. A lifetime of challenging inequality by United Nations News, agencies   3 Sep. 2026 (UN News)   Gloria Steinem, the journalist and women's rights campaigner who became one of the most influential voices of the feminist movement, has died at the age of 92. In an announcement, her family said she had passed away on Wednesday at her home in New York City, surrounded by some of the many who loved her.   UN News revisits a powerful moment from Ms. Steinem's appearance at UN Headquarters in New York in 2016, when she took her message about violence against women to the global stage.   In her landmark speech ten years ago, the pioneering activist warned that violence against women is inseparable from questions of peace, security and democracy.   “The single most important element or determinant of whether a country is violent within itself or whether it will be willing to use military violence against another country is not poverty, not access to natural resources, not religion or even degree of democracy. It’s violence towards females.” ‘This is a world issue’.   Ms. Steinem pointed to the many forms violence against women can take, from sexual violence in war – to trafficking, female genital mutilation (FGM) and violence in the home.   She also spoke about the consequences of cultures where sons are prioritised over daughters, and the resulting long-term impact on societies.   “This is not a women’s issue… This is not a children’s issue. This is a world’s issue.”   Violence against women remains a pervasive global public health and human rights concern. According to the latest data from the gender equality agency UN Women, an estimated 840 million women – almost one in three – have been subjected to physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence, non-partner sexual violence, or both at least once in their life.   Ending violence against women and girls is central to the global effort to achieve gender equality. For Ms. Steinem, the treatment of women offered a revealing measure of the societies in which they lived.   “The easiest way to figure out how democratic and peaceful any group is, is to see: are there women there and how are they being treated?”   Ms. Steinem became one of the most recognizable voices of the feminist movement in the United States during the 1960s and 1970s. She helped highlight issues including reproductive rights, discrimination, political representation and violence against women – bringing them into the mainstream. She was also a co-founder of Ms. magazine and worked with generations of activists seeking greater equality.   Underlining that “each of us has some part of the knowledge, the solution, the insight, the understanding that will contribute to the whole”, she said that listening was key.   http://news.un.org/en/story/2026/09/1168272 http://www.unwomen.org/en/articles/facts-and-figures/facts-and-figures-ending-violence-against-women http://www.unwomen.org/en/articles/explainer/what-is-feminism http://equalitynow.org/news/news-and-insights/commemorating-and-celebrating-gloria-steinem-the-life-and-legacy-of-a-feminist-trailblazer/ http://www.ms.now/opinion/gloria-steinem-death-feminism-living-room-talking-circles http://womensmediacenter.com/about/press/press-releases/womens-media-center-mourns-passing-of-gloria-steinem-wmc-co-founder-journalist-author-activist-feminist-organizer-friend http://now.org/media-center/press-release/our-hero/ http://msmagazine.com/author/gloriasteinem http://www.gloriasteinem.com/about http://www.unrisd.org/en/library/blog-posts/feminist-foreign-policy-is-where-hope-meets-reality http://www.nobelwomensinitiative.org/convening-report-nairobi Visit the related web page
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