Accessing Abortion

Explores the global landscape of abortion law reform

In many countries, barriers to abortion access—legal, cultural, or practical—have been dismantled in places as diverse as Mexico, Kenya, Thailand, and Ireland. Yet, in a few countries—the United States and Poland to name two—obstacles to abortion abound. Why? Why do some countries find abortion access a publicly polarizing issue and others a relatively uncontroversial health and family decision? Why has abortion access been a rallying point for progressive political organizing and, in others, the site of democratic backsliding?

In Accessing Abortion, expert academics and lawyers look to countries that have passed permissive abortion laws to make visible how legislation both settled and stirred conflict in politically-divided environments. By comparing the process of enacting laws in these countries, the volume spotlights current social mobilization for and against abortion rights. At the same time, the volume assesses how these varied and comparative national developments unfolded in an international and transnational context where the floor of what countries can do is set by international human rights norms. Ultimately, this collection aims to show how law and public policy functions to facilitate both permissive and restrictive abortion law reform, and how that reform then changes the delivery of abortion services. Providing a sustained comparative analysis of the costs and benefits of legislating and/or judicializing abortion rights across the globe, Accessing Abortion assesses what is missing from contemporary conversations on reproductive justice.