Posted by ccld201
6 March 2026Reproductive Governance in the Twenty-First Century
Reproductive governance has emerged as a crucial arena of contestation in the twenty-first century, encompassing questions of gender identity, the relationship between science and religion, the limits of intervention upon the female body, and the status of the unborn. Biomedical advances and governmental policies continually challenge seemingly settled principles, whilst the progressive juridical subjectification of the foetus and embryo facilitates an opposition between woman and fertilised body, thereby undermining the right to voluntary termination of pregnancy.
Abortion legislation falls into four broad categories: absolute prohibition, legalisation with specific conditions, free choice, and mixed models, yet none of these frameworks is definitively established. Though abortion is often portrayed as bound to immutable and universal religious and ethico-philosophical values, it constitutes a “mobile category” whose definition depends upon context. Debate intensified from the eighteenth century onwards with the development of embryology and the visual personification of the foetus.
In the nineteenth century, the regulation of birth became explicit: motherhood was publicly valorised whilst simultaneously becoming laden with social responsibility. Between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the nation-state intervened directly in procreation, and under fascism and Nazism, maternity was reduced to its biological function in the service of national interests. In Italy, for example, the 1930 Rocco Code criminalised abortion as an offence against “the integrity of the race”.
Legislative Frameworks in Europe
France introduced the Veil law in 1975, whilst Italy’s Law 194 of 1978 decriminalised abortion under specific conditions. However, conscientious objection limits its implementation — affecting 68.4% of gynaecologists in 2018 and 63.6% in 2021 — and advisory clinics are often inadequate. Since 2018, some local authorities have adopted pro-life motions, effectively delegitimising access to abortion services.
Whilst the European Union provides guidance, it cannot impose measures. The 2002 Resolution recommends that abortion be legal, safe, and accessible, and internationally, abortion is increasingly framed as a healthcare service linked to the right to health. Global feminist movements champion self-determination, exemplified by Ireland’s 2018 referendum, which repealed the constitutional ban (66.4% in favour), and by widespread protests in Poland that initially blocked restrictive legislation, though subsequent judicial and political pressure have since dramatically curtailed access there. In the United States, each state maintains its own regulations; the Supreme Court appointments made during the first Trump administration consolidated a conservative orientation culminating in the 2022 Dobbs ruling.
According to The Lancet, global abortion rates declined from 40 to 35 per 1,000 women between 1990 and 2014, primarily in developed nations owing to improved education and contraception, whilst in developing regions, rates remained unchanged.[1] Crucially, restrictive laws do not reduce abortions but increase health risks for women.
WHO Guidelines and Global Statistics
On 8 March 2022, the WHO published new guidelines on safe abortion, replacing the 2012 framework. Globally, 6 out of 10 unintended pregnancies and 3 out of 10 pregnancies end in induced abortion, with 45% of abortions deemed unsafe, particularly in developing countries and amongst vulnerable groups, resulting in significant mortality and morbidity. The WHO has reiterated that the legal status of abortion has no bearing on whether a woman terminates an unwanted pregnancy, but profoundly affects her access to safe abortion.
During the Pandemic: Recourse to Medical Abortion
The pandemic severely affected access to safe abortion in various countries, including Italy, where Law 194’s framework proved inadequate. Simultaneously, however, the pandemic facilitated expansion of telemedicine and encouraged access to medical abortion through self-managed approaches. The WHO’s guidelines now include comprehensive abortion care via telemedicine up to the twelfth week of pregnancy amongst essential health services.
France authorised medical abortion via telemedicine from the start of lockdown, whilst the UK commenced this in summer 2020. In Italy, the August 2020 ministerial circular removed hospitalisation requirements but did not introduce at-home provision. Nevertheless, medical abortions increased substantially: the 2023 report recorded 48.3% using RU486 (compared to 31.9% in 2020 and 3.3% in 2010), with overall terminations totalling 63,653 and confirming a steady decline since 1983. Italy’s termination numbers remain amongst the lowest internationally.
In countries that first introduced medical abortion, rates now exceed 70% in France and the UK and 90% in Northern Europe. More recently, global feminist and non-profit networks have combined demands for decriminalisation with practical support for safe self-managed abortion. Since the pandemic, increasing numbers of Italian women have sought information via Women on Web, through practices that reject stigmatising interpretations and reframe the meaning of clandestine abortion. The 2016 estimate put the figure at 10,000–13,000 abortions outside the Italian health system, whilst gestational limits continue to underpin travel from Italy to other European countries offering care beyond twenty-two weeks.
Constitutional Dimensions
The aforementioned Dobbs ruling of 2022 overturning Roe v. Wade represented the culmination of a long conservative consolidation of the United States Supreme Court. Whilst not precluding termination in principle, it enables individual states to criminalise abortion, creating discrimination amongst citizens, and the originalist approach determining this reversal jeopardises other civil rights.
Of particular interest in this regard is the New York Times’ ongoing project to track abortion legislation across all fifty states in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization — a resource that is continuously updated to reflect the rapidly evolving legal landscape.
In reaction, on 4 March 2024 France modified its Constitution to guarantee women’s freedom to terminate pregnancy. Subsequently, on 11 April 2024, the European Parliament voted to insert abortion rights into the Charter of Fundamental Rights, affirming autonomy over one’s own body and universal access to sexual and reproductive health services without discrimination. The situation remains uneven, with the EU pressing for greater harmonisation in guaranteeing reproductive rights as human rights.
Critical Reflections: Abortion, Women’s Rights, and Democracy
Abortion law functions as a litmus test for democracy. Where access is restricted — through prohibition, conscientious objection, or institutional capture by pro-life actors — what is at stake is women’s status as full citizens. Stéphanie Hennette-Vauchez has extensively examined the intersection of abortion, constitutional law, and democracy. As she and Laurie Marguet argue in De haute lutte: La révolution de l’avortement (2025), access to abortion has never been voluntarily conceded by states but wrested through sustained feminist struggle — a process that remains fragile and reversible, as the Dobbs ruling starkly confirms. Reproductive rights cannot be disaggregated from the wider architecture of women’s citizenship: their restriction correlates systematically with women’s marginalisation from public life, economic independence, and political representation. The democratic deficit is equally legible at the supranational level. The 2025 European citizens’ initiative My Voice, My Choice called upon the EU to fund safe abortion access for women unable to obtain it in their own member states — reframing cross-border access as a matter of intra-European solidarity rather than anomaly, and enacting a transnational feminist politics that refuses to treat the nation-state as the ultimate arbiter of rights. Constitutionalisation — France’s 2024 reform, the European Parliament’s vote on the Charter — is significant but not self-executing: without implementation infrastructure, a guaranteed right remains a right in name alone.
Alessandra Gissi is an Associate professor of Contemporary History, Department of Human and Social Sciences, University of Naples L’Orientale (Italy).