This article tracks the gender politics of the processes that led to the adoption of the Millennium Development Goals and that continued to feature in subsequent policy debates. It suggests that this politics is rooted in tensions between conceptualisations of rights and capabilities that characterised the preceding decade. Feminist efforts since the 1990s have focused on defending sexual and reproductive rights in the face of the attacks mounted by an ‘unholy alliance’ led by the Vatican and supported by a shifting group of countries and religious groups. This has led to the relative neglect of the economic injustices associated with the dominant market-led model of development.