As Professor Ziegler’s article and prior books show, the reversal of Roe v. Wade has been an overarching goal of the abortion-restrictive movement. With that goal approaching—indeed if the l...

Abortion is one of the most controversial issues in today's world. People tend to turn to the law when trying to decide what is the best possible solution to an unwanted pregnancy. Here the author's views on abortion are discussed from a lawyer's and a woman's point of view. By taking into consideration the rights of the fetus an “antagonistic relationship” between the woman and her unborn child may occur. Therefore, women should have more autonomy in the issue. (...) The article concludes with examples of cases in the United States and Ireland where the rights of the fetus are considered more important than those of the mother because of existing laws. This article suggests that a more inclusive ethics of abortion is required rather than a new ethics of abortion when “translating fetal life into law”. (shrink)

Although statistically common, and legal since 1973, abortion still bears significant stigma--a proverbial scarlet A. Fear of this stigma leads most of the women and men who are part of the 21% of American pregnancies that end in abortion to remain silent. This book brings the story of ordinary abortion out of the shadows and invites a new conversation about its actual practice, ethics, politics, and law. Katie Watson lends her incisive legal and medical ethics expertise to (...) navigate wisely and respectfully one of the most divisive topics of contemporary life. (shrink)

This paper explores the rhetoric of obstetric ultrasound technology as it relates to the abortion debate, specifically the interpretation given to ultrasound images by opponents of abortion. The tenor of the anti-abortion approach is precisely captured in the videotape, Ultrasound:A Window to the Womb. Aspects of this videotape are analyzed in order to tease out the assumptions about the (female) body and about the access to truth yielded by scientific technology (ultrasound) held by militant opponents of (...) class='Hi'>abortion. It is argued that the ultrasound images do not offer transparent confirmation of the ontological status of the embryo and fetus. Rather, the window of ultrasound is constructed through a complex combination of visual and verbal devices: ultrasound images, photographic images, verbal argument, and emotional appeal. (shrink)

The foundational concepts of Part I (IJAP, Vol. 37, no. 2) are here elaborated and applied to unintended and unwanted pregnancies resulting from consensual intercourse, both within and outside of marriage. Following a brief enquiry into Scriptural presuppositions about unwanted pregnancy, different sorts of provisional, constrained or impaired consent to separating the unitive and procreative ends of intercourse are analyzed. Their common reliance on erroneous beliefs and disordered precepts is investigated along the way to evaluating three Thomisticly validated excuses for (...) seeking a defensively unjustified abortion, and the quasi-involuntary origin of intellectual blind spots about such moral errors is explicated in terms of a Thomist account of perceptual apprehensions, sensitive passions, and conceptual intellect. The basic features of both excused and justified defensive abortions are then shown to provide a coherent basis for shaping abortion laws in accordance with the Constitutionally protected rights of self-defense and liberty in procreation, as well as the Thomist principles of just legislation. (shrink)

In “The Ethics of Access: Reframing the Need for Abortion Care as a Health Disparity,” Watson considers the advantages of framing the need for abortion as an issue of health disparities. Dra...

Many current abortion regulations represent an over-medicalization of abortion or a corruption of abortion's true medical nature, with disproportionate consequences to women with lower incomes and lesser means. This article explores the effects of unnecessary and harmful abortion restrictions on women living in poverty. A brief summary of the major abortion rights cases explains how the Constitution, as currently interpreted, vests the government and sometimes the medical profession with the power to protect women's health, rather (...) than granting this power to women themselves. The article then argues for a new approach for protecting women's health and respecting their dignity by reframing reproductive rights as health rights that women themselves can assert. (shrink)

Is the “act itself” of separating a pregnant woman and her previable child neither good nor bad morally, considered in the abstract? Recently, Maureen Condic and Donna Harrison have argued that such separation is justified to protect the mother’s life and that it does not constitute an abortion as the aim is not to kill the child. In our article on maternal–fetal conflicts, we agree there need be no such aim to kill (supplementing aims such as to remove). However, (...) we argue that to understand “abortion” as performed only where the death of the child is intended is to define the term too narrowly. Respect for the mother, the fetus, and the bond between them goes well beyond avoiding any such aim. We distinguish between legitimate maternal treatments simply aimed at treating or removing a damaged part of the woman and illegitimate treatments that focus harmfully on the fetal body and its presence within the mother’s body. In obstetrics as elsewhere, not all side effects for one subject of intervention can be outweighed by intended benefits for another. Certain side effects of certain intended interventions are morally conclusive. (shrink)

Earl Conee has argued that the metaphysics of personal identity is irrelevant to the morality of abortion. He claims that doing all the substantial work in abortion arguments are moral principles and they garner no support from rival metaphysics theories. Conee argues that not only can both immaterialist and materialist theories of the self posit our origins at fertilization, but positing such a beginning doesn’t even have any significant impact on the permissibility of abortion. We argue that (...) this thesis is wrong on both accounts. We do so, in part, by relying on a hylomorphic rather than a Cartesian conception of the soul. There are good reasons for believing such a soul theory can favor an earlier origin than the leading materialist accounts. We also show that the theological metaphysics of hylomorphism provide greater support for a pro-life position than the Cartesian position Conee discusses. However, we argue that even on a materialistic account of personal identity, metaphysics has substantial bearing upon the morality of early abortions. (shrink)

Hinduism and Zoroastrianism have strong historical bonds and share similar value-systems. As an instance, both of these religions are pro-life. Abortion has been explicitly mentioned in Zoroastrian Holy Scriptures including Avesta, Shayast-Nashayast and Arda Viraf Nameh. According to Zoroastrian moral teachings, abortion is evil for two reasons: killing an innocent and intrinsically good person, and the contamination caused by the dead body. In Hinduism, the key concepts involving moral deliberations on abortion are Ahimsa, Karma and reincarnation. Accordingly, (...) abortion deliberately disrupts the process of reincarnation, and killing an innocent human being is not only in contrast with the concept of Ahimsa, but also places a serious karmic burden on its agent. The most noteworthy similarity between Zoroastrianism and Hinduism is their pro-life approach. The concept of Asha in Zoroastrianism is like the concept of Dharma in Hinduism, referring to a superior law of the universe and the bright path of life for the believers. In terms of differences, Zoroastrianism is a religion boasting a God, a prophet, and a Holy book, while Hinduism lacks all these features. Instead of reincarnation and rebirth, Zoroastrianism, like Abrahamic religions, believes in the afterlife. Also, in contrast with the concept of Karma, in Zoroastrianism, Ahura Mazda can either punish or forgive sins. (shrink)

This target article considers the ethical implications of providing prenatal diagnosis and antenatal screening services to detect fetal abnormalities in jurisdictions that prohibit abortion for these conditions. This unusual health policy context is common in the Latin American region. Congenital conditions are often untreated or under-treated in developing countries due to limited health resources, leading many women/couples to prefer termination of affected pregnancies. Three potential harms derive from the provision of PND in the absence of legal and safe (...) class='Hi'>abortion for these conditions: psychological distress, unjust distribution of burdens between socio-economic classes, and financial burdens for families and society. We present Iran as a comparative case study where recognition of these ethical issues has led to the liberalization of abortion laws for fetuses with thalassemia. We argue that physicians, geneticists and policymakers have an ethical and professional duty of care to advocate for change in order to ameliorate these harms. (shrink)

Pregnant women and persons engaging in homosexual practices compose two groups that have been and still are amongst those most severely subjected to coercive restrictions regarding their own bodies. From an historical point of view, it is a recent and rare phenomenon that a woman’s right to abortion and a person’s right to engage in homosexual interactions are recognized. Although most Western liberal states currently do recognize these rights, they are under continuous assault from various political and religious movements. (...) Moreover, though liberal theories of justice typically defend women’s rights to abortion and people’s rights to homosexual activity, these theories often struggle to capture the fundamental ground for these rights. For example, it appears hard for the liberal to say why and when only the woman and not the embryo/fetus has rights and why the right to certain sexual practices is not on par with rights to other preferences. Contemporary liberal theories of justice, therefore, have a hard time identifying what distinguishes questions of abortion and sexual activities from other questions of right and thereby also have difficulty capturing the gravity of the wrongdoing involved in coercively restricting homosexual interactions and abortion as such. I argue that Kant’s theory of justice succeeds on both counts, because it can locate the fundamental ground for these rights in an understanding of the bodily integrity of the person. Just states will neither permit nor outlaw all abortions or sexual interactions, but rather will require all such laws to be reconcilable with the protection of each person’s right to freedom. (shrink)

An important strand in the debate on abortion focuses on the moral status of fetuses. Knowledge of the moral value of fetuses is needed to assess fetuses’ moral status. As Errol Lord argues, acquaintance plays a key role in moral and aesthetic knowledge. Many pregnant persons have acquaintance with their fetus that provides privileged access to knowledge about that fetus’ moral value. This knowledge is (a) very difficult to acquire without being pregnant and (b) relevant for assessing the moral (...) status of fetuses. This has implications for public debate on abortion and the research methods of philosophers working on abortion. (shrink)

I take issue with the view that libertarian theory does not imply any particular stand on abortion. Liberty is the absence of interference with people’s wills—interests, wishes, and desires. Only entities that have such are eligible for the direct rights of libertarian theory. Foetuses do not; and if aborted, there is then no future person whose rights are violated. Hence the “liberal” view of abortion: women (especially) may decide whether to bear the children they have conceived. Birth is (...) a good dividing line between the freedom to abort and the point at which society is permitted to take an interest. Once born, children detach from their mothers; no invasion of their bodies is necessary to separate them. Yet some ways of bringing them up can have a negative impact on society. There is a thus legitimate interest in protecting ourselves from the results of truly bad parenting. (shrink)

Giubilini and Minerva present a clear argument for the view that, other things being equal, reasons that justify abortion also hold for early infanticide.1 A reasoned argument deserves a reasoned response. Instead, many responses following the electronic publication of the article were mere outpourings of outrage and abuse to the authors and the editor of the Journal of Medical Ethics.2The principal arguments put by Giubilini and Minerva date back some 40 years, when Michael Tooley presented a strong case for (...) the moral equivalence of abortion and infanticide. According to Tooley, only ‘continuing selves’ are ‘persons’, and only persons can be ascribed a ‘right to life’. …. (shrink)

Writers, philosophers, and theologians have oft made the comparison between being a mature human being and a masterpiece work of art or design. Employing the analogy between the creation of artistic value and the creation of full-fledged human value, this paper stakes out a middle ground between pro-choice and pro-life by considering a more general account of value and the relationship between being a potential X and a mature implementation of X's potential. I argue that the value of a potential (...) X is a function of a number of factors, most importantly, what I call the "accessibility relation" between a potential X and a full-fledged instantiation of this potential. The value is as much intrinsic to the “seed” as to some future implementation of the seed’s potential. This approach inclines even a secular humanist to reasonably confer a significant degree of moral value to a human conceptus, and even more to an early term fetus. (shrink)

This article argues that the concept of personhood is intrinsically relational and that a relational understanding of created personhood can be derived from divine personhood and understood systematically in relation to itself, the pre-personal world and to other persons. Insofar as this set of three relationships is understood to be dislocated by sinful self-enclosedness in the penultimate reality and standing in contradiction to the ultimate reality retrospectively constituting it, the article suggests that all created personhood at present could be called (...) ‘potential’ personhood. The article then examines the concept of personhood maintained by Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva in their recent paper on ‘after-birth abortion’ in comparison to Johannes Fischer’s discussion of embryonic stem cell research and personhood. In response to both, the article concludes that it is not possible at present for humans to make a concrete external identification of the divine relation that internally constitutes created personhood. As a result, the article proposes adopting a veil of ignorance with reference to the status of embryonic personhood, as it would be worse to deny the status of personhood to an actual person than to attribute personhood to a non-person. (shrink)

In a recent column, “Faith, science and the abortion debate: Do abortion rights advocates follow the facts, wherever they lead?” at Religion News Service (reposted at America as “In the abortion debate, it’s the pro-lifers who have science on their side”), theologian-bioethicist Charles Camosy reports that pro-choice advocates sometimes deny scientific facts that are relevant to abortion debates. This response critiques his comments.

Developing World Bioethics, Volume 22, Issue 3, Page 125-125, September 2022.

Bernard Gert argues that legitimate moral disagreement calls for tolerance and moral humility; when there is more than one morally acceptable course of action, then intolerance and what Gert calls “moral arrogance” would be objectionable. This article identifies some possible difficulties in distinguishing moral arrogance from moral reform and then examines Gert's treatment of abortion as a contemporary example of moral disagreement that he characterizes as irresolvable.

McGovern, Kevin After a brief account of the Victorian Law Reform Act 2008, this article reports on three responses to this law in the last year. Because Section 8 of this law restricts the healthcare practitioner's usual right of conscientious objection, this article also discusses conscience and conscientious objection.

Presuming the truth of a dominant conception of an African ontological system, this chapter offers some understanding of African moral theory and its recommendations for abortion. I argue that an African moral theory, all things equal, forbids abortion.

The most important contribution which professional philosophers could make to the debate concerning abortion would be to produce a detailed conceptual analysis of the sorts of situations in which abortion is typically contemplated and/or performed and a set of moral considerations and/or principles which would be applicable to any such case. I argue that the sorts of hypothetical cases and fanciful analogies typically used by philosophers in their discussions of abortion can be either appropriate or inappropriate for (...) this purpose, and attempt to illustrate this difference by considering several possible interpretations of some of the scenarios diacussed in J.J. Thomson’s classic paper “A Defense of Abortion” together with some of my own. (shrink)

This book traces the roots of the contemporary abortion debate in the tradition of existential philosophy of the Sartrian type by investigating the work of four feminist writers on abortion—each with a specific focus: Simone de Beauvoir, Mary Daly, Carol Gilligan, and Beverly Wildung Harrison. _No Higher Court_ attempts to envisage a pro-life feminism that is able to provide a "new world for women without abortion as its linchpin and bedrock.".

Recently, Perry Hendricks argued that abortion is immoral even if the fetus is not a person. He did so by arguing that causing a future child to suffer from fetal alcohol syndrome is wrong because it is an impairment, and an abortion would be an even more substantial impairment. Here I reply that the argument depends on ignoring relevant facts that are essential for moral decision‐making. Moreover, if we adapt the argument to consider these essential facts, then the (...) argument fails because it no longer applies to the case under consideration. (shrink)

This article examines how one of the most striking differences between the central doctrines of the Catholic Church and the secular context of Swedish society, attitudes to abortion, is managed by the Swedish church hierarchy and commentators in the official newsletter of the Catholic Church of Sweden. Using Foucauldian concepts of power, the article concludes that in its marginal position, the Catholic Church in Sweden mixes the traditional pastoral and sovereign power of the church with the way pastoral power (...) is exerted in modern society, in its efforts to continue asserting its influence over the possible courses of action for pregnant women. While traditionally abortion has been a woman’s crime, in the Swedish Catholic context it becomes rather the crime of the secular society. This means also that the image of woman as being responsible for her decisions and in need of forgiveness gives way to an image of woman as a victim in need of understanding. (shrink)

A recent article argued for the immorality of abortion regardless of personhood status by comparing the impairment caused by fetal alcohol syndrome to the impairment caused by abortion. I argue that two of the premises in this argument fail and that, as such, one cannot reasonably attribute moral harms to abortion on the basis of the moral harms caused by fetal alcohol syndrome. The impairment argument relies on an inconsistent instantiation, which undermines the claim that personhood is (...) irrelevant, and it does not fulfill its own ceteris paribus clause, which demands that no additional benefit be gained from abortion that would not be gained from causing fetal alcohol syndrome. (shrink)

In most countries where Islam is acknowledged as a, or the, source of legislation, abortion is permitted under certain conditions and at certain stages of pregnancy. This article examines some of these laws and argue that they represent a continuation of the logic that governed the views of pre-modern Muslim jurists on abortion, that is, harm aversion. However, these laws also add a ‘modernist’ twist to that logic – rather than repealing that logic altogether, modernist views on ‘rights’ (...) and the advancement of medical knowledge and technology have influenced the priorities of Muslim jurists and lawmakers as far as abortion and the issues associated with it are concerned. This influence has furthermore been possible by a conscious selection and blending of pre-modern views to serve modern concerns. In all this, however, harm aversion remains the centrifugal principle, even when the abortion discourse in Muslim countries appears couched in the modernist discourse of rights. (shrink)

This paper explores the rationale for violence and coercion aimed at preventing abortion conceived as the killing of an innocent person. Some important arguments for personhood at conception are examined, and in the light of the examination the paper considers whether they warrant concluding that a free and democratic society should pass laws recognizing personhood at conception. The wider concern is what principles such a society should use as a basis for legal coercion and what principles conscientious individuals should (...) use insofar as they judge that self-defense or, especially, protection of the innocent, requires violence. (shrink)

In “Abortion and Ownership” John Martin Fischer argues that in Judith Jarvis Thomson’s violinist case you have a moral obligation not to unplug yourself from the violinist. Fischer comes to this conclusion by comparing the case with Joel Feinberg’s cabin case, in which he contends a stranger is justified in using your cabin to stay alive. I argue that the relevant difference between these cases is that while the stranger’s right to life trumps your right to property in the (...) cabin case, the violinist’s right to life does not trump your right to liberty in the violinist case. (shrink)

George, B. J. Jr. The evolving law of abortion.--Guttmacher, A. F. The genesis of liberalized abortion in New York: a personal insight.--Callahan, D. Abortion: some ethical issues.--Jakobovits, I. Jewish views on abortion.--Drinan, R. F. The inviolability of the right to be born.--Schwartz, R. A. Abortion on request: the psychiatric implications.--Fleck, S. A psychiatrist's views on abortion.--Niswander, K. R. Abortion practices in the United States: a medical viewpoint.--Macintyre, M. N. Genetic risk, prenatal diagnosis, and (...) selective abortion.--Messerman, G. A. Abortion counselling: shall women be permitted to know?--Pilpel, H. F. and Zuckerman, R. J. Abortion and the rights of minors. (shrink)

The Islamic government of Iran recently passed and announced a new law titled “Rejuvenation of the Population and Protection of the Family.” This legislation is a noteworthy example of biopolitics‐influenced biolaw. In terms of abortion, contraception, prenatal screening, and population control, this law clearly contrasts with women's fundamental rights and freedoms and has significant health‐related consequences for different sectors of the population. A historical review of the population policies of the Islamic Republic of Iran shows the occurrence of multiple (...) abrupt and radical changes in such policies over the past four decades. This new law, promoted by religious biopolitics, is the most recent example, and places stringent limits on abortion. According to it, all decisions concerning abortion must be made in courts rather than in health clinics. Such courts are typically presided over by male religious scholars. This law also limits prenatal screening to the degree that will increase the rate of genetic defects, especially in the population's lower socioeconomic strata. By strictly limiting access to contraception, this law will increase the rate of unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases. This paper argues that such an influence of biopolitics on biolaw contrasts with the principles of bioethics. Still, Iran's current institution of bioethics cannot address it effectively. Therefore, a new model of interaction between bioethics, biopolitics, and biolaw is needed to prevent the detrimental consequences of such pieces of legislation. Such a paradigm shift is demanded by the current “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement of the Iranian people. (shrink)