IV 

118TH CONGRESS 

1ST SESSION H. RES. 209 

Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives regarding the importance of taking a feminist approach to all aspects of foreign policy, 

including foreign assistance and humanitarian response, trade, diplomacy, 

defense, immigration, funding, and accountability mechanisms. 

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

MARCH 8, 2023 

Ms. LOIS FRANKEL of Florida (for herself, Ms. LEE of California, Ms. 

KAMLAGER-DOVE, Ms. BARRAGA ́N, Ms. BONAMICI, Mr. BOWMAN, Mr. 

CA ́RDENAS, Mr. CASTRO of Texas, Mrs. CHERFILUS-MCCORMICK, Ms. 

CHU, Mr. CICILLINE, Ms. CLARKE of New York, Ms. CROCKETT, Ms. 

DEAN of Pennsylvania, Ms. ESHOO, Mr. GARCI ́A of Illinois, Mr. GRIJALVA, Ms. JACKSON LEE, Ms. JAYAPAL, Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia, Mr. 

KEATING, Mr. KHANNA, Ms. KUSTER, Ms. MCCOLLUM, Mr. MCGOVERN, 

Ms. MENG, Mr. NADLER, Ms. NORTON, Ms. OMAR, Ms. PORTER, Ms. 

PRESSLEY, Ms. SA ́NCHEZ, Ms. SCHAKOWSKY, Mr. SHERMAN, Ms. STEVENS, Ms. TITUS, Ms. TLAIB, Ms. TOKUDA, Mrs. TORRES of California, 

Mr. VARGAS, Ms. VELA ́ZQUEZ, Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, Mrs. WATSON

COLEMAN, and Ms. WILLIAMS of Georgia) submitted the following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs 

RESOLUTION 

Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives regarding the importance of taking a feminist approach to 

all aspects of foreign policy, including foreign assistance 

and humanitarian response, trade, diplomacy, defense, 

immigration, funding, and accountability mechanisms. 

Whereas a feminist approach to public policy requires meaningful analysis of and proactive challenges to power 


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structures and inequalities based on intersecting systems 

of discrimination, including discrimination on the basis of 

race, age, language, socioeconomic status, physical or 

mental ability, sex, including gender identity or expression and sexual orientation, indigenous identity, religion, 

ethnicity, citizenship, and nationality or migrant status; 

Whereas foreign policy reflects how a government defines and 

prioritizes peace and security, structures international 

trade, provides humanitarian aid and development assistance, and works with other nations and non-state actors; 

Whereas feminist foreign policy is the policy of a State that 

defines its interactions with other States, as well as 

movements and other non-state actors, in a manner 

that— 

(1) prioritizes peace, gender equality, and environmental integrity; 

(2) enshrines, promotes, and protects the human 

rights of all; 

(3) seeks to disrupt colonial, racist, patriarchal, and 

male-dominated power structures; and 

(4) allocates significant resources, including research, to achieve that vision; 

Whereas feminist foreign policy is coherent in its approach 

across its levers of influence, anchored by the exercise of 

those values at home and cocreated with feminist organizations, movements, and stakeholders, at home and 

abroad; 

Whereas women’s rights are human rights and foreign policy 

in the United States should be representative, inclusive, 

responsive, and accountable to stakeholders, and should 

take an intersectional approach, utilizing a power-based 


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analysis that reveals, acknowledges, and seeks to correct 

for inequalities; 

Whereas feminist foreign policy includes a focus on key thematic priorities of bodily autonomy, peace, environmental 

integrity, and justice, which are often left behind in foreign policy development and discourse; 

Whereas, although women and girls make up approximately 

half of the world’s population, they face considerable disparities relative to men and boys in their access to rights, 

resources, and agency around the world, and— 

(1) as of 2022, women had on average three-quarters of the legal rights as men worldwide; 

(2) the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender 

Gap report for 2022 estimates that at the current rate 

of change, it will take 132 years for there to be gender 

parity across the four dimensions it examines: health and 

survival, economic participation and opportunity, educational attainment, and political empowerment; 

(3) there are 1,800,000,000 young people in the 

world and approximately half of them, 900,000,000, are 

adolescent girls and young women; 

(4) as early as age 6, girls’ levels of ambition and 

self-confidence in their abilities are impacted by gender 

discrimination and harmful stereotypes, and girls aged 12 

to 17 are more at risk of dropping out of school than 

boys around the world; 

(5) in 2022, around the world women held only 22.9 

percent of parliamentary seats and 16.1 percent of ministerial positions; 

(6) approximately one-third of women globally have 

experienced gender-based violence, which increases in settings of crisis, conflict, and humanitarian emergencies; 


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(7) in 2021, 81,000 women and girls were killed 

worldwide, 45,000 of them by an intimate partner or 

family member; 

(8) in 2021, only 5.8 percent of military contingents 

and 14.4 percent of uniformed police units in United Nations peacekeeping missions were women; 

(9) in low- and middle-income countries, 

218,000,000 women want to delay or prevent pregnancy 

and have an unmet need for family planning services and 

supplies, which can lead to unintended pregnancies and 

health complications, and limit women’s and girls’ opportunities to pursue education, economic, and civic engagement; 

(10) women face more constraints than men do in 

accessing foreign markets; 

(11) immigration law itself tends to marginalize 

women, relying on outmoded models of family, migration 

patterns, and economic mobility that often fail to account 

for the reality of women’s lives when migrating; 

(12) women and girls face increased risks in crisis; 

and 

(13) in the past decade, women provided over 43 

percent of the agricultural labor in low- and middle-income countries, yet comprised more than 60 percent of 

the world’s chronically hungry people; 

Whereas in a world in which there is gender equality and 

women can fully participate in all spheres of life— 

(1) global gross domestic product could increase by 

$28,000,000,000,000 over 10 years; 

(2) the percentage of hungry people could be reduced by 12 to 17 percent if women had equal access to 

agricultural resources; and 


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(3) peace agreements are 35 percent more likely to 

last over 15 years when women are at the negotiating 

table; 

Whereas as foreign assistance by the United States helps 

tens of millions of people each year, often providing lifesaving aid while accounting for approximately 1 percent 

of the United States Federal budget, a smaller amount 

supports gender equality, and— 

(1) about 3 percent of assistance in 2020 was reported as specifically for gender equality programs; 

(2) only about 19 percent of assistance in 2020 was 

reported as including key components to address gender 

equality issues within projects that have a primary focus 

other than gender equality across all sectors; and 

(3) an even smaller amount of aid funding finds its 

way to local, women-led and feminist organizations and 

grassroots gender equality movements, and in 2020, the 

United States only disbursed $1,000,000 to women’s 

rights organizations and institutions, and as of 2021, in 

the past 10 years has not disbursed more than 

$10,000,000 in a year; 

Whereas a feminist foreign assistance policy in the United 

States would promote gender equality and focus on the 

experience of women and people who experience multiple 

and intersecting forms of discrimination, such as genderbased violence, lack of access to sexual and reproductive 

health, rights, and justice, lack of access to education, 

and the burden of unpaid care responsibilities; 

Whereas the long-lasting impacts of the COVID–19 pandemic 

highlighted the need to take a feminist approach to foreign policy with many impacts disproportionately affecting women and girls, including— 


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(1) the United Nations Educational, Scientific and 

Cultural Organization (UNESCO) finds that over 90 percent of students were affected by pandemic-related school 

closures, that approximately 1,500,000,000 students had 

their learning disrupted, and that approximately 

11,000,000 girls were put at risk for permanently dropping out of school by the pandemic; 

(2) the economic impact of the pandemic has had a 

disproportionate effect on women, and the 780,000,000 

women who rely on informal employment lost on average 

60 percent of their prepandemic income in the first 

month of the pandemic; 

(3) on average, the ratio of women’s employment to 

population dropped more than that of men due to the 

COVID–19 pandemic according to the International 

Labour Organization; 

(4) UN Women, the United Nations Development 

Programme, and the University of Pardee Center for 

International Futures estimated that the COVID–19 

pandemic put 388,000,000 women and girls at risk of 

falling into extreme poverty in 2022, compared to 

372,000,000 men and boys, worsening the already existing gender-poverty gap; 

(5) worldwide, women have shouldered the bulk of 

unpaid care and domestic work resulting from the pandemic, and even prior to the pandemic, women on average performed more than three times the amount of unpaid work relative to men; 

(6) the COVID–19 pandemic disrupted efforts to 

end child marriage, and could result in an additional 

13,000,000 child marriages taking place between 2020 

and 2030 that would otherwise have been averted; 


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(7) nearly 12,000,000 women lost access to family 

planning services and 1,400,000 unintended pregnancies 

in low- and middle-income countries occurred in just the 

first year of the pandemic; 

(8) an estimated 243,000,000 women worldwide 

were subjected to sexual or physical violence by an intimate partner between April 2019 and April 2020, and 45 

percent of women have been exposed to at least one form 

of violence against women either directly or indirectly 

since the start of the pandemic; and 

(9) due to the disruption of programs to prevent female genital mutilation in response to COVID–19, an additional 2,000,000 female genital mutilation cases will 

need to be averted to eradicate the practice by 2030; 

Whereas, in mid-2022, over 100,000,000 people were displaced from their homes due to violence, disaster, conflict, and persecution, more than 339,000,000 people will 

be in need of humanitarian assistance in 2023, and tools 

and initiatives to center women, girls, and people of all 

gender identities in humanitarian responses, such as Safe 

from the Start and the Inter-Agency Standing Committee 

Gender Handbook for Humanitarian Action, should be 

used to respond; 

Whereas trade is a necessary and vital component of a nation’s economic success and growth and a key part of its 

engagement with other nations, and— 

(1) in 2022, United States exports and imports totaled approximately $3,009,700,000,000 and 

$3,957,800,000,000, respectively; and 

(2) a feminist trade policy would promote women’s 

rights and equitable and dignified labor practices 

throughout the value chain, as well as reduce and mitiVerDate Sep 11 2014 01:34 Mar 09, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00007 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6300 E:\BILLS\HR209.IH HR209

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gate the harmful impacts of climate change associated 

with trade; 

Whereas feminist diplomacy fosters increased collaboration 

and cooperation among State and non-state actors, including championing equality and supporting the institutions and mechanisms that facilitate cooperation, nonmilitary conflict resolution, and peaceful competition, and 

that mitigate the effects of climate change; 

Whereas a total of 13 governments have implemented or announced an intention to implement feminist foreign policies and the G7 has recognized ‘‘feminist development, 

foreign and trade policies’’ and has committed to 

strengthen the rights, resources, and opportunities for 

women and girls in all their diversity in every sphere; 

Whereas defense efforts support the goal of a more peaceful, 

equitable, and healthy planet, with peace as the ultimate 

aim of defense, and a military policy that prevents and 

responds to gender-based violence in conflict and that 

meaningfully includes women and those who face discrimination in security forces, peace negotiations, and 

postconflict rebuilding, in accordance with United States 

commitments to the Women, Peace, and Security Act of 

2017 (P.L. 115–68) and its necessary implementation; 

Whereas migration remains a global and growing phenomenon, and— 

(1) the number of international migrants reached an 

estimated 281,000,000 persons in 2020; 

(2) women constitute nearly half of global migrant 

flows; 

(3) the United States is the leading country of destination, hosting 50,632,836 foreign-born people, includVerDate Sep 11 2014 01:34 Mar 09, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00008 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6300 E:\BILLS\HR209.IH HR209

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ing over 613,700 naturalized citizens in fiscal year 2022; 

and 

(4) a feminist approach to immigration would integrate an analysis of the impact of immigration policy on 

women, children, people of all gender identities, and indigenous people; and 

Whereas strong transparency and accountability are critical 

to ensuring that promises to advance a feminist approach 

are honored through full funding and include the development of participatory approaches to policy formulation 

and implementation, the setting and reaching of specific, 

time-bound and measurable goals that do no harm and 

are desired by and beneficial to those impacted, and 

transparent reporting on the progress toward goals: Now, 

therefore, be it 

1 Resolved, That the House of Representatives— 

2 (1) supports the goals of a feminist foreign pol3 icy; 

4 (2) supports the adoption of policies that pro5 mote gender equity and women and girls’ participa6 tion in public life, including women and girls’ edu7 cation, equitable access to health care, representa8 tion in public office, economic security and oppor9 tunity, access to rights and resources, inclusion in 

10 foreign markets, and participation in peacekeeping, 

11 military, and diplomatic missions; 

12 (3) recognizes that a whole-of-government effort 

13 that ensures coherence of a feminist approach across 


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1 all streams of foreign policy is necessary to achieve 

2 those goals, and must include— 

3 (A) high-level leadership with a mandate to 

4 design and implement a feminist foreign policy 

5 with clearly articulated objectives; 

6 (B) commitment to gender parity, diver7 sity, equity, and inclusion, both internally 

8 among leadership and staff and externally, co9 created with civil society groups and other 

10 stakeholders outside of government; 

11 (C) the adoption of a zero-tolerance policy 

12 on gender-based violence and workplace harass13 ment, immediately eliminating policies that 

14 allow abusers to move from one post to another 

15 once accused without facing consequences re16 lated to their employment or promotion; 

17 (D) training and capacity-building to en18 sure robust implementation; 

19 (E) gender analysis underlying all aspects 

20 of foreign policy; 

21 (F) adequate resourcing to ensure all of 

22 the above; and 

23 (G) regular and public reporting on efforts 

24 and outcomes; and 


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1 (4) commits to work with civil society groups 

2 and other stakeholders inside and outside of govern3 ment to advance a more feminist foreign policy in 

4 the United States. 

Æ 


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