Reproductive justice

Reproductive justice is 'the human right to maintain personal bodily autonomy, have children, not have children, and parent the children we have in safe and sustainable communities,' according to SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective, the first organization founded to build a reproductive justice movement. The term reproductive justice combines reproductive rights and social justice. It was coined and formulated as an organizing framework by a group of Black women who came together for that purpose in 1994 and called themselves Women of African Descent for Reproductive Justice. In 1997, 16 women-of-color-led organizations representing four communities of color – Native American, Latin American, African American, and Asian American – then launched the nonprofit SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective to build a national reproductive justice movement. Additional organizations began to form or reorganize themselves as reproductive justice organizations starting in the early 2000s.'Reproductive Justice is the complete physical, mental, spiritual, political, economic, and social well-being of women and girls, and will be achieved when women and girls have the economic, social, and political power and resources to make healthy decisions about our bodies, sexuality, and reproduction for ourselves, our families, and our communities in all areas of our lives.''The control and exploitation of women and girls through our bodies, sexuality, and reproduction is a strategic pathway to regulating entire populations that is implemented by families, communities, institutions, and society. Thus, the regulation of reproduction and exploitation of women's bodies and labor is both a tool and a result of systems of oppression based on race, class, gender, sexuality, ability, age and immigration status. This is reproductive oppression as we use the term.' Reproductive justice is 'the human right to maintain personal bodily autonomy, have children, not have children, and parent the children we have in safe and sustainable communities,' according to SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective, the first organization founded to build a reproductive justice movement. The term reproductive justice combines reproductive rights and social justice. It was coined and formulated as an organizing framework by a group of Black women who came together for that purpose in 1994 and called themselves Women of African Descent for Reproductive Justice. In 1997, 16 women-of-color-led organizations representing four communities of color – Native American, Latin American, African American, and Asian American – then launched the nonprofit SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective to build a national reproductive justice movement. Additional organizations began to form or reorganize themselves as reproductive justice organizations starting in the early 2000s. Reproductive justice emerged as an issue because women with low incomes, women of color, and LGBTQ+ women and trans people felt a sense of neglect in the women's rights movement, which focused primarily on abortion rights. Reproductive justice goes beyond the pro-choice movement by acknowledging the fact that a woman cannot freely choose what she wants to do with her pregnancy when her options are limited by oppressive circumstances or lack of access to services. Reproductive justice focuses on abortion access rather than abortion rights, asserting that the legal right to abortion is meaningless for women who cannot access it due to the cost, the distance to the nearest provider, or other obstacles. In addition to abortion access, the reproductive justice framework also includes other issues affecting the reproductive lives of women and trans people of color, including access to: contraception, comprehensive sex education, prevention and care for sexually transmitted infections, alternative birth options, adequate prenatal and pregnancy care, domestic violence assistance, adequate wages to support families, and safe homes. Reproductive justice is based in the international human rights framework, which views reproductive rights as human rights. The framework focuses on addressing how different oppressions intersect to impact people's reproductive lives. It centers the needs and leadership of the most marginalized people rather than the majority, asserting that reproductive oppression will not be eradicated until 'even the most vulnerable people are able to access the resources and full human rights to live self-determined lives without fear, discrimination, or retaliation.' The term 'reproductive justice' was coined in 1994 by a group of Black women called Women of African Descent for Reproductive Justice. They gathered in Chicago for a conference sponsored by the Illinois Pro-Choice Alliance and the Ms. Foundation for Women with the intention of creating a statement in response the Clinton administration's proposed plan for universal healthcare. The conference was intentionally planned just before the attendees would be going to the International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo, which reached the decision that the individual right to plan one's own family must be central to global development. The women developed the term as a combination of reproductive rights and social justice, and dubbed themselves Women of African Descent for Reproductive Justice. They launched the framework by publishing full-page statement titled 'Black Women on Universal Health Care Reform' with 800+ signatures in The Washington Post and Roll Call addressing reproductive justice in a criticism of the Clinton health care plan. The women who created the reproductive justice framework were: Toni M. Bond Leonard, Reverend Alma Crawford, Evelyn S. Field, Terri James, Bisola Marignay, Cassandra McConnell, Cynthia Newbille, Ross Loretta Ross, Elizabeth Terry, ‘Able’ Mable Thomas, Winnette P. Willis, and Kim Youngblood. Loretta Ross, co-founder and National Coordinator of the SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective from 2005–2012, defines reproductive justice as a framework created by activist women of color to address how race, gender, class, ability, nationality, and sexuality intersect. As a concept, reproductive justice was created by these activist women of color because they felt that the dominant paradigm of 'pro-choice' did not meet their needs. They reported not being able to exercise reproductive choices as easily as their more privileged counterparts. For them, reproductive politics was not about choice, but about justice. Abortion discourse in the United States is often explained in terms of being 'pro-choice,' i.e. in favor of abortion rights, or 'pro-life,' i.e. favoring fetal development and protection of the life of the 'unborn child' and opposing abortion. Reproductive justice challenges the pro-choice/pro-life dichotomy. RJ understands 'choice' as something that divides women in policy and practice because it assumes that all women have an equal ability to make the same choices. Therefore, 'choice' ignores structural factors such as economic status, race, immigration state, etc. Some women's studies scholars like Greta Gaard argue that 'choice' is a 'scheme of omission' which means that it leaves many women out of the conversation, particular women of color, immigrant women, queer women, transgender women, etc. Structurally, these identities do not have the same degrees of choice when it comes to accessing reproductive care. Gaard argues that this further divides women according to class and race. This creates a need for a new frame that is more inclusive, and reproductive justice was created to be that frame. Reproductive justice is a critical, theoretical framework that was invented as a response to United States reproductive politics. The three core values of reproductive justice (RJ) are (1) the right to have a child, (2), the right to not have a child, and (3) the right to parent a child or children in safe and healthy environments. The framework moves women's reproductive rights past a legal and political debate to incorporate the economic, social, and health factors that impact women's reproductive choices and decision-making ability. Reproductive justice is based on the theory of intersectionality, which states that people have different life experiences and opportunities based on how their identity categories, such as race, class, gender, and sexuality, interact with each other. Reproductive justice explains how people oppressed by the marginalization of their intersectional identities also experience higher levels of reproductive oppression – systemic oppression that impacts their reproductive lives. This means that it is often harder for oppressed people to access healthcare because of factors such as education, income, geographic location, immigration status, and potential language barriers, among others. Activist women of color created this framework because they felt they did not have as much choice as their privileged counterparts when it came to making decisions about their bodies, healthcare, and reproductive lives. There are three frameworks that focus on women's reproductive needs: reproductive health, reproductive rights, and reproductive justice. The reproductive health framework addresses inequalities in health services by advocating for the provision of services to historically underserved communities. The reproductive rights framework emphasizes the protection of an individual woman's legal right to reproductive health services, focusing on increasing access to contraception and keeping abortion legal. The reproductive justice framework encompasses reproductive health and reproductive rights, while also using an intersectional analysis to emphasize and address the social, political, and economic systemic inequalities that affect women's reproductive health and their ability to control their reproductive lives.