20 August 2025
Attacks on Reproductive Control
In the U.S., authoritarian populists exploit gender politics by criminalizing pregnancy, restricting reproductive rights, and using criminal law to undermine women’s autonomy. Under Trump, these dynamics intensified, ranging from nationwide abortion bans to the erosion of healthcare protections and threats to contraception access. Such measures tap into racial and economic anxieties, reinforce patriarchal power, and resonate far beyond the United States. Continue reading >>
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23 July 2025
Another Step in the Anti-Abortion Agenda
Trump’s recently passed “One Big, Beautiful Bill” bars Medicaid reimbursements to Planned Parenthood for one year. The provision is now temporarily blocked after Planned Parenthood filed suit. But it builds on, and must be read against, the backdrop of Medina v. Planned Parenthood, a recent and disastrous Supreme Court ruling initiated by South Carolina. The case starkly illustrates the Court’s continued alignment with an anti-abortion agenda advanced through state governments and forms part of a broader assault on civil rights. Not least, its entanglement with Medicaid signals a deeper campaign against the poor and access to healthcare. Continue reading >>
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21 July 2025
Decriminalising Abortion in England and Wales
On 17 June 2025, British MPs took an important step in decriminalising abortion against a backdrop of rising prosecutions for "later" abortion. Once the amended Crime and Policing Bill becomes law, people who voluntarily end their own pregnancies will be exempt from criminalisation. But, unless a further amendment is made, those good faith actors who provide abortion, or support others in getting access, remain at risk of criminal investigation. Five aspects of the recent legal changes are worth emphasising as lessons for a strategic perspective on defending, and even expanding, reproductive freedom. Continue reading >>
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27 May 2025
Challenging Safe Access
Safe Access Zones (SAZ) in Great Britain, in force since autumn 2024, establish protective areas around abortion service providers and criminalise specific behaviours within these zones. However, ongoing anti-abortion protests raise questions about the practical enforceability of the new laws. This article examines whether SAZ laws can withstand these challenges and argues that they succeed in striking a fair balance between the rights of anti-abortion demonstrators and pregnant persons seeking access to lawful abortion services under the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). Continue reading >>
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06 February 2025
A Dangerous Departure
Governments from Argentina to the United States to Hungary and beyond are engaging in concerted efforts to assail and undermine sexual and reproductive rights that have long been understood as gendered interpretations of fundamental rights under international law. In this context, the recent decision by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in Beatriz v. El Salvador is a missed opportunity to consolidate the Court’s jurisprudence on sexual and reproductive health and rights and defend the legitimacy of international human rights law. Continue reading >>
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13 November 2024
Silent Prayer vs Safe Access
In line with a broader trend, all three jurisdictions in the United Kingdom now have Safe Access Zones legislation that creates a protective area around premises where abortion services are provided. Specified behaviours are criminalised within these protective areas, with silent prayer being a common challenge. I argue that the UK Safe Access Zones legislation demonstrates a cautious approach that protects a pregnant person’s right to access lawful abortion services in conditions of dignity and privacy. Continue reading >>13 October 2024
Legislating Reproductive Rights
In May, the Brazilian parliament introduced a bill that included a gestational age limit for performing abortions, even in cases where the pregnancy resulted from rape. In practice, the bill would criminalize women who were victims of sexual violence, especially young girls. The proposal triggered a strong reaction from civil society, which ultimately prompted parliament to withdraw the bill. The case illustrates how the Brazilian parliament has become a dangerous place for women’s sexual and reproductive rights – a situation that has worsened due to an institutional dispute between the parliament and the constitutional court. Continue reading >>
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29 April 2024
Chaos, Confusion and Republican Change-Up
Grasping the rules for getting an abortion in the American states is no easy matter for pregnant women, for abortion doctors, or for outside observers trying to understand how deeply entangled abortion is with the 2024 Presidential Election in November. The story is complicated, fast-moving, and not over yet. As Bette Davis warned her party guests, “Fasten your seatbelts; it’s going to be a bumpy night”. Continue reading >>
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20 December 2023
Not Just Abortion
On 14 December 2023, the European Court of Human Rights ruled in the case M.L. v. Poland. The ECHR decided that the restrictions on abortion rights that Poland had violated Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life) of the European Convention on Human Rights. Contrary to the hopes of the initiators of the case, this is not a European Roe v. Wade moment. The ECHR again refused to affirm that Article 8 can be interpreted as conferring a right to abortion. Nevertheless, the ECHR made significant findings regarding Polish rule of law violations. Continue reading >>
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20 July 2023