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This article revisits the consecration and universalization of women’s rights accompanying the four world conferences on women organized by the United Nations between 1975 and 1995. It questions the linear narrative of a “global feminism” that failed to take account of the tensions developed during the Cold War over divergent political interpretations of women’s rights in the opposing, capitalist and socialist camps. After a brief overview of research findings focused on activist campaigning within the UN framework after 1975, the article considers the contexts in which the concept of “global feminism” was developed. It traces the social trajectory of one of its principal theorists, in order to clarify the social mechanisms that led in the early 1990s to the emergence of “global” ideological references, such as “women’s human rights” and gender mainstreaming.