extended definition essay on abortion

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• v.79(1); 2012 Feb

Book Review: The Ethics of Abortion: Women's Rights, Human Life, and the Question of Justice

William e. may.

Emeritus Pontifical John Paul II Institute For Studies on Marriage and Family Washington, D.C.

The Ethics of Abortion: Women's Rights, Human Life, and the Question of Justice by  Christopher Kaczor. New York:. Routledge,  2011.  x+246. pp. 

Christopher Kaczor's thorough study of “the ethics of abortion” is logically organized as follows: 1) introduction (1–12); 2) “Does Personhood Begin after Birth?” (14–37); 3) “Does Personhood Begin at Birth?” (38–55); 4) “Does Personhood Begin During Pregnancy?” (56–90); 5) “Does Personhood Begin at Conception?” (91–120); 6) “Does the Human Embryo Have Rights?” (121–144); 7) “Is It Wrong to Abort a Person?” (145–176); 8) “Is Abortion Permissible in Hard Cases?” (177–214); 9) “Could Artificial Wombs End the Abortion Debate?” (215–230). He answers “no” to numbers 2, 3, and 4, and “yes” to number 5. His own answer to numbers 6, 7, and 9 is “yes,” but his strategy is to consider and reject arguments answering “no” to these questions; his own answer to number 8 is “no,” but again his strategy is to consider and rebut arguments for a “yes” answer.

Kaczor asks whether “personhood,” not “human life,” begins at different points. He does so because today many claim that not all living members of the human species are persons with rights; only “persons” have rights, and killing human beings who are not persons does not violate any “right” to life.

First let us examine the rich contents of Kaczor's book. I will then close with an evaluative critique.

1. The Introduction

Kaczor believes that sound philosophical reasoning informed by a careful examination of the evidence can show that the vast majority of abortions are morally unjust (12). But he is convinced that meaningful and respectful dialogue between defenders and critics of abortion is possible if two key truths are honored. The first is the difference between the subjective culpability of the agent and the objective morality of the act as determined by relevant moral principles and norms. We must not, indeed cannot, judge those who choose to have or defend abortions. “Whatever one's view of abortion itself, refraining from making judgments about the character of those touched by abortion (in whatever way) is helpful in treating the topic properly, and more importantly, I believe (but won't defend here), that it is an essential part of being a decent human being” (5). The second is to avoid loaded language such as anti-life, anti-choice , etc. and use instead terms such as defenders of abortion, critics of abortion (6).

2. Does Personhood Begin after Birth?

Defenders of the claim that personhood begins after birth include Michael Tooley and others who accept the definition (or varieties and nuances thereof) of person given by Peter Singer: namely, “a being is a person if and only if the being has 1) an awareness of his or her own existence, 2) over time and in different places with 3) the capacity to have wants, and 4) plans for the future” (17–18). Kaczor provides an exhaustive critique of this definition and the four “person-making” criteria it stipulates, along with a critique of the efforts of many (Julian Savulescu, Galen Strawson, David Boonin, a “later” Tooley and his colleague Laura Purdy, and others) to “nuance” this definition and offer more sophisticated versions of it in order to answer objections, among them the criticism that, if strictly interpreted, Singer's definition would include among non-persons those who are sleeping or anesthetized, and if more loosely interpreted would include those in deep coma or severely mentally disabled (24–32).

A common claim is that the unborn and newly born are not actual persons but only “potential persons.” Responding to this claim, Kaczor distinguishes between a “passive potency” and an “active potency.” The former requires the intervention of an agent extrinsic to the being to effect the change from potential to actual (e.g., a sapling has a passive potency to become the leg of a chair) whereas the sapling has the active potency to become a mature tree (24). In defending this distinction Kaczor shows the absurdity of scenarios invented by writers like Nicole Hassoun and Uriah Kriegel to show how an oyster could develop its own rational powers if it were transported to Mars and if living on Mars made oysters capable of this (24–25).

Kaczor counters Jeff McMahan's argument that neonates and young children are not “persons” by a reductio ad absurdum. McMahan argued that since rational functioning determines moral worth, then there are degrees of personhood, and some persons are of greater value not only than non-rational humans but also than some rational ones. He further argued that there is no logical reason why rational entities with rational capacities might not be manufactured. In fact, McMahan himself had to admit that his idea that those persons whose rational capacities are greater than others have more rights than other persons is “dangerously invidious” (23).

Kaczor also shows that the acceptance of the Dutch “Gronigen Protocol” by Hilde Lindemann and Marian Verkerk is rooted in the a priori and falsifiable presupposition that the most humane way to treat severely handicapped newborns is to kill them to save them from a life of “hopeless and unbearable suffering.” This view presupposes that there is such a thing as a life not worth living and that one can judge that another human being is better off dead than alive. But empirical studies show that individuals who have suffered a lifetime because of a genetically-caused serious handicap or accident do not want to be so killed (33–34).

3. Does Personhood Begin at Birth?

Kaczor's procedure in showing that the answer to this question is “no” is to summarize and criticize the specific views of different authors (e.g., Mary Ann Warren, David Boonin, H. Tristam Englehardt, Ronald Green, Lawrence Tribe), playing them off against each other and showing their inconsistencies and in particular the inconsistencies in the changing views of Warren; he likewise briefly examines the nature of partial-birth abortion, and the Supreme Court's ruling affirming a constitutional right to this procedure and by that ruling reaffirming the conventional pro-choice view that abortion ought to be legally permissible throughout the nine months of pregnancy until the human being has been entirely removed from the woman's body (38–55).

4. Does Personhood Begin during Pregnancy?

Kaczor examines the following stages during pregnancy when different authors think the living human being becomes a “person” with a serious right to life: conscious desires/interests (Bonnie Steinbock); viability ( Roe v. Wade ); quickening/fetal movement (Kaczor names no one who holds this but simply proposes and then disposes of arguments claiming this); sentience (Ronald Green, David Overberg, et al.); human appearance (Roger Wertheimer; Jane English); brain development (Baruch Brody who, however, completely repudiates abortion after the brain appears, although Kaczor fails to note this); implantation (Bernard Nathanson prior to his conversion; Stephan Coleman). Kaczor rebuts these proposals by appealing to relevant scientific studies and to the infighting among defenders of abortion over these criteria for determining the beginning of personhood. In criticizing the claim that the human organism becomes a person when the brain is developed, Kaczor appeals to D. Alan Shewmon's refutation of the rationale used to claim that the brain is the central organizing element in the human person (79–81).

Of special interest in this chapter is Kaczor's presentation of and refutation of the developmental view or the multicriterial approach of Mary Anne Warren in her later writings, which is endorsed by Green and others. According to this approach, each of the criteria noted earlier fails as a sufficient criterion for determining personhood if taken individually. However, if they are taken together they lead to the conclusion that the right to life (a right of “persons”) gradually gains strength as pregnancy progresses, and the more similar the human being in utero is to “full-fledged” persons like those of us who are born, the greater the protection it deserves. Nonetheless before birth this being is not , Warren claims, a full-fledged person with a serious right to life (83–85).

Her claim ignores the vast difference in the right to life and other rights. There are age restrictions on voting, driving, and being elected to public office because these rights imply abilities to discharge specific responsibilities. But the right to life does not imply any corresponding responsibilities and so can be enjoyed regardless of age or mental capacities. And Warren's view has other problems as well.

Since Kaczor had shown in the earlier chapter that personhood does not begin after birth , he ends this chapter by saying that inconsistencies and inner contradictions of the most important arguments that personhood arises during pregnancy point to the logical conclusion that personhood begins at conception, the issue of the following chapter (90).

5. Does Personhood Begin at Conception?

Kaczor begins his yes answer to the question by saying that he will address not one but two questions. The first is “a moral question that inquires as to who is a member of the moral community; the second is a biological question that seeks to know when human life begins” (91). The first question is extremely important, not only for the abortion issue and other ethical issues but also because its answer presupposes or reinforces at least implicitly a general theory of personhood. Kaczor draws on Robert Spitzer's Healing the Culture: A Commonsense Philosophy of Happiness, Freedom, and Life Issues and John Kavanaugh's Who Count as Persons? Human Identity and the Ethics of Killing to contrast the endowment account of personhood and the performance account of personhood (93). After criticizing efforts (e.g., by Jeff McMahan, S. Matthew Liao) to defend the performance account of personhood and efforts to discredit the endowment account (e.g., by Martha Nussbaum), Kaczor argues that every human being is a rational animal (Aristotle's definition centuries ago; man is the zoon logikon , animal rationale ). Moreover every human being is not potentially a rational being, but a currently existing actual rational being. Kaczor illustrates this by using examples from pathology—for instance, some men are sterile and cannot therefore reproduce when united in the bodily act of genital intercourse with a woman. But this is a pathological condition, and these men's generative organs remain generative even if they cannot be exercised. Thus human beings from conception on are the kind of beings who are actual existing rational beings even if these rational powers, rooted in their being, must be developed in order to be exercised, but they could not be developed if they were not there to begin with, etc. (98–102).

The second question, when does a human being begin to exist, is a biological or scientific question and Kaczor, making his own the scientific studies cited by Patrick Lee, 1 shows that this evidence leaves no doubt about the beginning of human beings; they come to be at conception, when the sperm from the man fuses with the oocyte of the woman and a new organism, distinct from mother and father, begins to be, with the active potency to develop into an embryo, fetus, newborn … senile old person. Kaczor then offers another argument, which he calls the “constitutive property” argument, to support this conclusion (105–120). (Kaczor notes that David Boonin had articulated this argument. He does not, however, point out that Boonin's articulation of the argument is in essence a misreading of the argument proposed by Paul Ramsey years ago; Boonin discusses this argument in his widely ac-claimed A Defense of Abortion 2 ). The “constitutive property” is that all human beings from conception on are rational animals , i.e., bodily beings with the active potency to develop and exercise the rational acts of forming concepts, judgments, and arguments, and of making free choices.

6. Does the Human Embryo Have Rights?

In answering “yes” to this question, Kaczor does not give arguments to show that embryos have rights. His strategy is to consider and answer “several major objections to the view that the human embryo is a person, a being due fundamental respect” (121). He had examined those objections and rejected them in chapters 2, 3, and 4. This chapter is thus somewhat repetitious. It focuses on twelve arguments proposed by defenders of abortion to deny personal rights to human embryos: the acorn analogy; the size of the embryo; twinning; embryo fusion; the high embryo mortality rate; hylomorphism (the “delayed hominization theory”); the anti-abortion, anti-contraception argument; the argument that cells are not persons; the embryo rescue case; the bag of marbles analogy; cost-benefit analysis; the uncertainty argument.

I will not consider these objections and Kaczor's replies to them in any detail, but I will illustrate his strategy in his replies to the arguments based on monozygotic twinning and on fusion, as well as the high embryo mortality rate, or “wastage,” argument.

Some (Mary Warnock, Jeff McMahan) argue that the phenomenon of monozygotic twinning proves that an individual human being cannot exist in the early stages of pregnancy. Kaczor's basic reply is that even if one being can be divided into two, this does not mean that it was never an individual being, something demonstrated by cloning, an artificial kind of twinning. He stresses the difference between individuation and indivisibility : the fact that one being can be divided into two does not mean that it was never an individual being. It is also possible that the original human zygote died and in doing so gave rise to two or more individual human beings (127–129).

It may be possible that two human zygotes can fuse into one. The argument (Harris, Green) is that two human beings cannot fuse into one; therefore two human zygotes cannot so fuse but rather become “humanized” with the appearance of the primitive streak fourteen days after conception. All this case shows is that two human beings were in existence prior to fusion (and no instances of the fusing of human embryos have been recorded so far as I know, although Kaczor does not note this), and now the two human beings cease to exist and a new human being takes their place (129–130).

Embryo wastage or high embryo mortality

The argument (Green, McMahan) is that if embryos were truly human beings and especially if they were persons, parents would grieve over miscarriages as they do over the death of a toddler or aunt or beloved friend, whereas they do not. But most women do grieve over miscarriages. Far more important, however, is that grieving a death is itself irrelevant to whether an entity is a human being or person. There seems to be a relatively high rate of “embryo” wastage. But, Kaczor argues, experts think that this is the result of gross abnormalities and serious deficiencies in the reproductive process because of incomplete fertilization. In a majority of cases, it is likely that no human being or person was “wasted” or lost but rather some non-human organism. In addition, all human beings die, some during pregnancy, others at birth, others at different stages of their lives, but their deaths in no way show that they were not human beings or persons when they died (131–133).

7. Is it Wrong to Abort a Person?

Kaczor begins this chapter by declaring: “If every human fetus is a person, is abortion always wrong? It would seem so. Since having others respect one's right to life is a necessary condition for the possibility of enjoying all other rights (including the right to privacy and bodily integrity), it has a necessary priority over all other rights [with a reference to Spitzer's Healing the Culture ]” (145). But Kaczor does not show precisely why intentionally aborting a person, including unborn persons, is always morally wrong. Rather he criticizes some major arguments proposed by defenders of abortion justifying the killing of the unborn. The arguments are the following: the violinist analogy (of Judith Thomson), the burglar analogy (Thomson's), the “no worse off” analogy (Francis Kamm), the “special duties to children but not to fetuses” argument (Thomson), the comparative burdens objection (Thomson, Martha Nussbaum), the “does killing make the fetus worse off” argument (Kamm). Kaczor analyzes and criticizes these arguments from page 150 through page 176, giving special attention to Thomson's different “arguments/analogies” (150–167); in analyzing Thomson's thought he shows the significant moral distinction between foreseeing an evil effect and intending that effect, a distinction Thomson rejects.

I will not consider Kaczor's critique of all these arguments but rather show his procedure by briefly summing up his critique of Thomson's violinist analogy and his treatment of the key difference between foreseeing and intending. Most readers are familiar with the violinist analogy that Thomson used in her famous article “The Rights and Wrongs of Abortion,” published in the inaugural issue of Princeton University's Philosophy and Public Affairs in 1971, two years before Roe v. Wade. Just as a person does not have a moral obligation to allow the violinist plugged into her body while she is sleeping so that his blood can be purified by her kidneys to use her body for this purpose for nine months, so a woman who gets pregnant, perhaps after taking precautions (e.g., contraceptives) not to, has no obligation to allow the unborn child to continue to use her body for nurture for nine months; rather she has a right to have the child removed from her body even if its death is foreseen as an effect of its removal.

Thomson tries to buttress this analogy by referring to the Gospel story of the Good Samaritan. She thinks that if the woman were a “good” or “very good” Samaritan she would permit the violinist to remain plugged into her and the fetus to remain in her body for nurture until birth. But she says we are not obliged to be “good” or “very good” Samaritans, only “decent” Samaritans, and that a decent Samaritan would not be obliged to sustain the life of either violinist or fetus at such a severe cost to his own life.

Kaczor's criticism focuses on the Good Samaritan story. He says that the strength (or initial plausibility) of the analogy rests on the intuition that one may unplug oneself from the violinist, but he argues that Thomson's reference to the Good Samaritan considerably weakens her analogy. He stresses that the point of the story is moral and not legal . Thomson appeals to it as offering us moral wisdom (not religious faith). “Using the Good Samaritan story to justify not helping someone in need is,” Kaczor writes, “rather like using the race between the tortoise and the hare to justify a lack of perseverance” (150–151). He goes on to argue that the violinist analogy can be attacked on other grounds, for instance, on the right of the violinist and fetus to bodily integrity. Unplugging yourself from the violinist suggests that you are not violating his bodily integrity. But what if you could unplug yourself from him only by chopping him up or tearing him limb from limb or suctioning him away by a machine that grinds him to pieces? If one does this, is not one violating his right to bodily integrity, the same right the one to whom he is attached possesses? And to separate herself from the fetus, does not the woman have to have it ripped apart by a curette, or sucked out by a machine that grinds it into pieces, and in so doing she violates its right to bodily integrity? (151–152).

Kaczor emphasizes that Thomson's analogies proceed on the assumption that there is no moral difference between foreseeing and intending the evil effects of our actions, e.g., the death of a human person, say the violinist, the fetus, or an innocent non-combatant in war. But Kaczor goes on to show the centrality of this distinction for morality. We are in some way responsible for the unintended evil effects of our actions, for they would not take place if we did not choose to do the deeds that cause those effects (e.g., the deaths of innocent non-combatants caused by dropping bombs on a military target—what is now called “collateral damage”). However, we have a much greater moral responsibility for the actions we freely choose—i.e., intend—to do, as examples clarify, and here I offer some of my own. For instance, if I drive a car to go to the store, my chosen deed here and now is to drive the car to the store; in driving it I foresee that I will use up gasoline, wear out my tires, and pollute the atmosphere. But I do not intend these evil effects; indeed I would prefer that they not occur. Similarly, a dentist may foresee that he will cause me pain in doing some procedure on my teeth, but he is not intending that I experience the pain; if he does I will go to a different dentist. Many abortion defenders (e.g., Boonin, Thomson) reject this key distinction, and Kaczor takes up their objections in detail and answers them (157–162).

8. Is Abortion Permissible in Hard Cases?

Kaczor answers “no” to this question. He divides the chapter into two lengthy sections separated by a shorter one. The first major section discusses “Hard Cases for Critics of Abortion” (178–191), and these include the following: difficult circumstances, fetal deformity, abortion for the child's good, cases of rape and incest, abortion to save the mother's life. The second major section takes up “Hard Cases for Defenders of Abortion” (193–214), and these include the following: murder of pregnant women; sex selection abortion; abortion for frivolous reasons; safe and legal, but why rare? why parental opposition? prenatal bonding with “our baby”; morally permissible vs. morally objectionable; intermediate moral worth of the human fetus. The third and shorter section concerns “Cases of Conscience” (191–193). It will be useful to consider all of these.

Hard Cases for Critics of Abortion

Difficult circumstances.

The most common reason for abortion is that the circumstances of the pregnancy are not felt to be right either for the mother or for the child to be born. Typical circumstances of formidable difficulties are broken homes, drug abuse, crushing poverty, abusive relationships, fear of public humiliation, inability to complete education or do one's work. It would be arrogant and wrong to judge women seeking abortion because of these circumstances; what they need is support, not condemnation. But these circumstances can and do exist after a child is born and can even be worse. But even defenders of abortion would not use these circumstances to justify the intentional killing of a six-year-old child. Commonly accepted morality holds that such killing of innocent persons or helping others to do so is not ethically permissible even in the worst circumstances. Doing the right thing may be difficult and even heroic, but one is obliged not to do or facilitate such intentional killing (178–179).

Fetal deformity

Kaczor uses the same kind of reasoning to answer this difficulty. He notes the exceptional difficult case when prenatal testing shows that the unborn child has a disease or malady known to be fatal shortly after birth. Even if abortion is not chosen, the unborn child is doomed to death. Abortion will spare the mother the burden of continuing the pregnancy, the burden of giving birth, and the agony of waiting for the child to die after birth. Abortion seems justified by the principle that in such circumstances we should salvage the best out of a difficult situation. But Kaczor notes that abortion itself imposes serious burdens on the woman; more important ethically is that the expected lifespan of a person does not affect the permissibility of killing him. Thus if the human being in utero is a person, then intentionally killing him or her is impermissible even if he or she will shortly die (180–181).

Abortion for the child's good

This difficulty, similar to the previous one, appeals to the emotions and shows that the motives of those who abort unborn children for this reason are used to justify the intentional killing of innocent unborn persons. But good motives are not sufficient to justify freely chosen human acts. They cannot justify the intentional killing of innocent human persons whose lives are integral to their being (181–183).

Cases of rape and incest

In such cases (Kaczor treats incest as often the same as rape, since it usually occurs against the free consent of the woman) abortion is justified as the necessary means to protect the good of the mother. Kaczor first points out that if conception can be prevented, this is morally acceptable because the means chosen is not contraceptive (to impede the beginning of new life through a freely chosen genital act) but is rather to protect the woman from suffering further bodily violence from the rapist. (Kaczor does not himself spell this out in his text, but his footnote reference is to John Finnis's treatment of the matter in his Moral Absolutes of 1991, and Finnis clearly sets forth the reasons why this is true.) Kaczor emphasizes that most women who conceive a child after rape do not abort the child but bring it to birth and either place the child for adoption or raise him or her themselves.

But if the woman wants the abortion so that she will not be reminded of the suffering she endured by being raped, nonetheless the truth remains that the unborn child is an innocent human person with the same inviolable right to life as the pregnant woman. Like all other human persons, the mother has the corresponding duty to refuse to intentionally kill that person, which is what she does if she consents to abortion. Some (e.g., Thomson) object that this would require heroic virtue on the part of the woman. Kaczor acknowledges this, but he then affirms a most important truth, writing: “[S]ome circumstances, including those created by the evil choices of others, can sometimes remove the category of the merely permissible, leaving us with a choice between the morally wrong and the morally heroic. If a dictator orders you to torture your mother to death or face a firing squad, you will be faced with a choice between the morally wrong and the morally heroic” (184–185). And this, one will correctly infer, is the same situation for the woman made pregnant by being raped.

Abortion to save a mother's life

Kaczor addresses these cases by using what he calls “DER,” double effect reasoning, and he then briefly summarizes the requirements of this reasoning as summed up in the principle of double effect by Thomas Cavanaugh. 3 According to this summary of the principle of double effect and of double effect reasoning, performing an act with two morally significant effects is justified if “(1) the evil effect is not intended as a means or as an end; and (2) there is a proportionately serious reason allowing for the evil effect” (186).

Kaczor says that if we apply double effect reasoning to abortion, its first condition shows us the moral difference between “direct” and “indirect” abortion, and it is crucially important to distinguish abortions where fetal death is intentionally brought about (frequently called “direct” abortion) and procedures in which the death of the human being in utero is not intentionally brought about but is the side effect of what a person brings about intentionally (frequently called “indirect” abortion). Direct abortion is not justifiable because it is the intentional killing of an unborn human person. The second condition of double effect reasoning is fulfilled if the mother's life is at risk, because saving her life is a proportionately serious reason for allowing or tolerating the death of the unborn child. Kaczor then examines three cases in which the mother's life it at risk: ectopic pregnancy, cancer of the uterus, and the case when the baby has trouble exiting the birth canal.

He judges that abortion in the first two cases is “indirect” and the death of the unborn child a foreseen but not intended effect, and that therefore abortion in such cases is morally justifiable. He notes some debate among reputable writers who reject all intentional killing of innocent persons over different methods of coping with ectopic pregnancies, especially by use of the drug methotrexate. But he says that the majority of contemporary writers now accept salpingostomy: splitting of the fallopian tube in which the fetus has implanted, removing the unborn child, and sewing the tube up in order to increase the woman's chances of conceiving in the future. This method had been repudiated many years ago by J. Lincoln Bouscaren, a Jesuit canon lawyer who first developed an argument justifying salpingectomy as a morally permissible way to save the life of a mother if endangered by an ectopic pregnancy—a salpingectomy is the excision of the fallopian tube where the fetus had implanted rather than in the womb.

Kaczor also judges morally right radiation therapy or a hysterectomy, that is, removal of the uterus, to save the life of a pregnant woman suffering from cancer of the uterus and for whom life-saving treatment of the cancer cannot be postponed until the baby is born. In such a case, use of radiation therapy that would have as a side effect the death of the unborn baby, or a hysterectomy that would also result in its death, is justifiable insofar as the death of the unborn child is not intended but only the life-preserving therapy done to the mother (186–189).

The third case, when the unborn child cannot exit the birth canal because it is stuck in it and the pressure it exerts can cause the mother to die, is also called the craniotomy case because the unborn child can exit the birth canal if a craniotomy is performed on it, and this requires that the baby's skull be crushed. If the craniotomy is not done then both mother and baby will die; if it is done, the mother's life can be saved. Kaczor identifies four possible outcomes, the first three resulting if the doctor does nothing and the fourth resulting from his intervention: 1) both mother and child will die; 2) the baby will die, and then removing its corpse by crushing its head is not immoral; 3) the mother will die and then the child can be removed safely; and 4) the mother will be saved if a craniotomy is performed on the baby.

Kaczor notes that Germain Grisez, John Finnis, and Joseph A. Boyle have argued that in both the hysterectomy and craniotomy cases the death of the unborn child is neither the means nor the end intended and that there is no moral obstacle to engaging in these performances to save the life of the mother. 4 Kaczor thinks that one could argue that “even if the crushing of the baby's skull is not killing as a means to save the mother's life it may involve another evil means, namely the mutilation or violation of the physical integrity of the child,” and one could thus distinguish the craniotomy case from the hysterectomy case. But he then goes on to consider arguments for and against the claim that crushing the baby's skull is an unjustifiable mutilation because it results in the baby's death and the questions these arguments raise. He judges these questions to be of great importance and difficulty and leaves them as open questions (190–191).

Cases of Conscience

This brief section concerns the debate between critics of abortion and defenders of abortion about the place of conscience. Kaczor criticizes the 2007 paper “The Limits of Conscientious Refusal in Reproductive Medicine” issued by the Committee on Ethics of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG). This document shows that ACOG considers conscience not as one's best judgment concluding a process of moral deliberation from basic moral principles to practical conclusions about what one is obliged to do or not to do here and now. Rather, it regards conscience as someone's own private opinion about what he personally ought to do without any appeal to basic principles to justify that opinion. Conscience is more of a belief that must not be imposed on others. The ACOG document also requires doctors and other health-care personnel to refer patients to others if they feel that they cannot personally provide the standard reproductive services—these include artificially making children in the laboratory, providing contraceptives, and abortion. The ACOG document not only unfairly limits a doctor's liberty in action but also infringes on his right of free speech. For these and other reasons this position regarding the role of conscience must be repudiated (191–193).

Hard Cases for Defenders of Abortion

Murder of pregnant women.

Most people find the raping of women morally abhorrent and particularly odious if the woman is pregnant and even more so if it causes her to have a miscarriage. So true is this that even proponents of capital punishment balk at executing a pregnant woman. At times the male who has caused a woman to become pregnant assaults her in order to cause a miscarriage if she refuses to abort the child. A notorious example occurred when Scott Peterson killed his wife Luci, eight months pregnant with their son Connor. Missing from Christmas Eve, 2002, their bodies, separately, washed to shore on April 14, 2003, and Connor's umbilical cord was still attached. Despite protests by abortion rights advocates, the husband was legally charged by the California Court with two counts of murder, with “special circumstances” calling for tougher penalties. Laws similar to the one in California charging the murderer with two homicides are in effect in many states (193–194).

Sex-selection abortion

If abortion is done because a child of unwanted sex is known to be in the womb, another serious problem for defenders of abortion is posed. Sex-selection abortion almost always means the elimination of females and in some countries/cultures extends to their infanticide should they survive until birth. In the U.S., for instance, eighty-five percent of women and ninety-five percent of men want a male child for the first baby and the first baby may well be the last wanted. If abortion is not the killing of a person, it poses no problem different from the killing of a guppy (as Warren holds), but this kind of abortion troubles female defenders of abortion. But how could they criticize such abortions without implying that abortion itself is problematic? In fact, the American College of Gynecologists and Obstetricians (ACOG) opposes sex-selection abortion. Kaczor gives other good reasons for opposing sex-selection abortion (e.g., it leads to further violence against women) and concludes, “It is not a simple matter to condemn SSA [sex-selection abortion] while upholding abortion for other reasons” (194–200).

Abortion for frivolous reasons

Abortions are frequently done for very frivolous reasons—parents want a child conceived during a certain astrological sign, a Leo, say, rather than an Aries; or they want a child of a certain hair color. Kaczor cites Naomi Wolf, who identified some frivolous reasons used by classmates in her high school during the 1970s (for instance, a girl would try to get pregnant just to find out if she could; and if she did, she would abort the pregnancy). This is enough to illustrate the problem (200).

Safe and legal, but rare?

Abortion defenders frequently claim that they want to make abortion “safe, legal, and rare. “ But if there is nothing wrong with abortion and if it is a woman's right, what difference does it make how often a woman has one? Some sexually active women simply do not want to use contraceptives (and some begin their sexually active lives during their teens), and such women may want to have abortions rather frequently before they reach menopause. Some may say that abortion is bad for their health, physical and psychological, and that they therefore ought to practice birth control to avoid abortions. Certainly abortion is much more invasive and expensive than using contraceptives. But does this championing of contraception over abortion for health reasons not show that the emotional trauma frequently caused by abortion is perhaps due to the recognition that birth control prevents a new human life from coming into existence whereas abortion destroys one that has already come to be (200–202)?

Why personal opposition?

Many abortion advocates say that they are personally opposed to abortion but do not want to impose their views on others and want to keep abortion legal and safe. But presumably one is personally opposed because abortion is the unjust taking of a human life. A rebuttal of this argument is suggested by some defenders of abortion (e.g., McMahan). According to this rebuttal the critic of abortion is inconsistent if he says he is “personally opposed” to killing abortionists. If abortion really is a gravely unjust killing of the innocent, then violence to stop that killing seems morally required. To condemn this violence shows the inconistency of opposition to abortion. Kaczor answers this objection by noting, for instance, that many people think that the war against Iraq initiated by President Bush in 2003 was unjust and led to the unjust killing of many innocent persons. They did not, however, seek to assassinate him, and they have not been accused of inconsistency. So why make this charge against critics of abortion if they do not choose to kill abortionists? Kaczor offers other arguments of a similar kind to answer this problem (202–206).

Prenatal bonding with “our baby.”

Many parents immediately begin to love the unborn human being in the woman's womb as a person. But if this entity is not a person or has no moral worth, as abortion defenders claim, it is difficult to explain why these parents can be so terribly mistaken; in fact, many parents like this grieve deeply over a miscarriage, and if the unborn is not a person, their behavior seems silly or stupid, but it does not seem right to accuse them of this.

Elizabeth Harman offers a sophisticated argument to reply to this objection; her argument is based on what she terms the “Actual Future Principle.” According to this principle, if an early fetus has an actual future in which he or she will be conscious, then this human fetus has moral worth; but if an early fetus does not have an actual future of which he or she will be conscious, then the fetus has no moral worth. Parents who immediately love the unborn human being are acting reasonably since it is likely that this fetus will have an actual future of which it will be conscious, but obviously fetuses to be aborted will not have such an actual future. Kaczor rebuts this argument with four cogent considerations, and there is no need to set them forth here (206–209).

Morally permissible vs. morally objectionable

On this view abortion is legally permissible but morally objectionable. This distinction might help defenders of abortion respond to many of the hard cases and could even be extended to all abortions. Kaczor doubts that this distinction is a real one. There is a real distinction between the morally permissible and the morally heroic, between the obligatory and the supererogatory. Earlier (150–158, pages to which Kaczor now refers), he had shown that at times circumstances so shape a situation that one must choose between a heroic act and seriously violating an innocent person's inviolable right to life, and he suggests that this is the situation here (209–210).

Intermediate moral worth of the human fetus

Kaczor begins this section by writing: “[T]he defender of abortion can respond to all these [previous] cases with one rejoinder. The murder of pregnant women, a condemnation of sex-selection abortion, the moral impermissibility of abortion for insignificant reasons, personal opposition, the desire to see the practice of abortion become rare, and parental love for their prenatal children do not presuppose the personhood of the fetus, but rather that the human fetus has some value” (210). But if the human fetus has some value, so does a puppy, but we do not respect puppies as we do persons, so there is no reason to respect human fetuses as persons.

There are many objections to this claim and Kaczor neatly summarizes them, but in essence this claim was shown to be arbitrary in the chapters of his book showing that personhood does not begin after birth or at some time during gestation (211–214).

9. Could Artificial Wombs End the Abortion Debate?

Kaczor gives a “yes” answer to this question, but examines the issue first from the perspective of ardent defenders of abortion and then from that of ardent critics of abortion, answering objections to a yes answer.

From the Perspective of Ardent Defenders of Abortion

Kaczor asks what is meant by a “right to abortion.” It could mean a right to terminate the human embryo/fetus or a right to extricate it from the woman's body. They seem to be linked at present because methods used to extricate the fetus from the womb invariably kill it. But if an artificial womb becomes available, the distinction would be meaningful. Kaczor's reading of the literature convinced him that many ardent defenders of abortion in fact advocate only a right to evacuate the embryo/fetus and not to kill it, and he refers to many well-known defenders of abortion to show this (the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, Warren, Thomson, Boonin). Even some ardent defenders of abortion who also defend infanticide (Singer) think that if someone wants to adopt a healthy fetus brought to term in such an artificial womb it is difficult to see why it should die. Kaczor concludes that if ardent supporters of abortion like those named are willing to let live a fetus brought to term in this way, then artificial wombs could surely end the abortion debate for them (214–219).

From the Perspective of Ardent Critics of Abortion

Kaczor identifies some major objections to the use of artificial wombs by ardent critics of abortion: the artificiality objection, the IVF objection, the deprivation of maternal shelter objection, the birth within marriage objection, the integrative parenthood objection, the surrogate motherhood objection, the wrongful experimentation objection, the objection from the right of the child to develop within the womb of the mother.

The artificiality objection

Kaczor answers this by noting that neonatal intensive care units are highly artificial and are not ethically impermissible, and an artificial womb seems simply to be a further development along the same lines. Moreover, in the case of a pregnant woman about to have a hysterectomy because of cancer to protect her life, she would prefer to have her baby moved to such a womb than die as the foreseen but not intended effect of her cancer treatment.

The IVF objection

This objection fails to distinguish between complete ectogenesis, required by IVF, and partial ectogenesis when an unborn child is already in his mother's womb and is transferred to an artificial womb rather than being killed by direct abortion or as the unintended effect of a legitimate therapy (radiation therapy or hysterectomy for uterine cancer) on the mother.

The deprivation of the mother's sheltering womb objection

This is more serious and difficult to answer. However, unborn children whose lives are at risk in utero (e.g., if the mother is poisoned) are sometimes removed by doctors and cared for outside the maternal womb and there is no objection to this; some cases may become complicated but there is no reason in principle , to exclude use of an artificial womb to preserve the life of an unborn child whose life is in grave danger if he remains in his mother's womb.

The birth within marriage objection

Some critics of abortion emphasize that Donum vitae judges immoral birth outside of marriage as achieved by IVF and warns that IVF techniques can open the way to other forms of biological and genetic manipulation. Critics argue that use of artificial wombs is such manipulation. In fact, the document explicitly mentions the possibility of making such wombs and seems to condemn ectogenesis. But this passage does not condemn partial ectogenesis that in many ways simply extends the value of NICUs (newborn intensive care units) to protecting lives of unborn babies if those lives are in imminent danger of being lost.

The integrative parenthood objection

This objection is based on this passage of Donum vitae in particular: “a child has the right to be conceived, carried in the womb , brought into the world and brought up within marriage.” 5 This text and some others seem to exclude partial ectogenesis as undermining gestational parenthood. But this interpretation does not stand scrutiny. Were it to be understood as absolutely unexceptionable, it would follow that all women who become pregnant as a result of rape or incest ought to marry the unborn baby's father. But marriage after any pregnancy out of wedlock is not a good solution. It would be far better for the child if its mother gave it up for adoption after birth, and this requires heroic action on the mother's part and on that of the adopting parents.

The surrogate motherhood objection

This is based on the truth that surrogate motherhood is clearly wrong and strongly condemned by Donum vitae. But none of that document's definitions of surrogate motherhood include partial ectogenesis as a form of surrogacy.

The wrongful experimentation objection

Kaczor thinks that this is the most powerful objection against use of an artificial womb by women seeking abortion. One ought never subject unborn human persons to risky experiments that are not undertaken for their good but rather for the sake of their mothers, who want to rid themselves of their unborn children. Kaczor argues that basic bioethical principles justifying experimental procedures intended to save the lives of individuals in imminent danger of death could be applied to use of artificial wombs to protect the lives of unborn human persons who would otherwise be killed by abortion. If such experimentation led to the improvement of these techniques, use of an artificial womb would no longer be experimental but a common procedure subjecting a person to no unacceptable risks.

The objection of the right of the child to develop in his mother's womb

This seems a good one in the light of a passage from Pope John Paul II's Centessimus annus : “Among the most important of these [basic human rights] mention must be made of the right to life, an integral part of which is the right of the child to develop in the mother's womb from the moment of conception.” 6 “But,” Kaczor writes, “it is not evident from this or from other passages from John Paul II that he even considered the possibility of an artificial womb as a way of overcoming the impasse over abortion, let alone that he had considered and rejected this possibility” (227). He thus concludes that using this passage as a definitive magisterial judgment against use of an artificial womb for partial ectogenesis is not licit.

Kaczor's conclusion, after sorting through objections and offering responses to them, is that use of artificial wombs might well be a way to end the abortion debate (215–231).

10. Evaluative Conclusion

Kaczor's book gives good arguments to show that individual personal life begins at conception. He likewise shows, by a host of arguments, many of them playing defenders of abortion off against each other, that the distinction between being a living human being and being a “person” is based on erecting arbitrary criteria for personhood, criteria constantly subject to change. He also considers in some depth and with fairness specific arguments by a wide variety of scholars attempting to justify the practice of abortion and the right of women to abort the unborn at any time during their pregnancy. His work, moreover, is based on a comprehensive study of the literature; the bibliography is twelve pages long and references more than 250 items. His bibliography, however, does ignore some older and still important studies, including Germain Grisez's massive 1970 work Abortion: The Myths, the Realities, and the Arguments . 7

A good, strong point of this work, I think, is Kaczor's commentary and conclusion regarding the current dispute among Catholic scholars on the moral licitness of craniotomy as a means of saving the mother's life if the baby is stuck in the birth canal and pressure exerted on her can kill her.

There are some serious weaknesses in Kaczor's study, however. The chapters on the rights of the human embryo and on whether it is wrong to abort a person (chs. 6 and 7) are in my judgment very weak. In chapter 6, Kaczor defends the rights of the human embryo negatively by offering criticisms, many of them good in their own way, of arguments claiming that the human embryo is not a person and hence does not enjoy rights, as we have seen in the earlier presentation of the contents of that chapter. I think he could and should have offered a stronger positive defense of the rights enjoyed by human embryos, in particular the right not to be killed intentionally by others, if he had summarized or briefly mentioned with references, the brilliant work of Wesley Hohfeld, professor of legal ethics at Harvard University in the first half of the twentieth century, which is central to John Finnis's analysis of rights in his Natural Law and Natural Rights . 8 Hohfeld sharply distinguished between a “claim right,” or right in the strict sense, and a “liberty,” or “liberty right.” To distinguish these rights from each other, it is necessary to speak of a three-term relationship between two persons (or groups of persons) and an act of a specific type. If we do, we can speak of a claim-right as follows: A (=a person or group of persons, or all persons if we are speaking of basic human and inalienable rights of human persons) has a right (a “claim right”) that B (=another person, group of persons, or all persons) should x (=some specifiable act), if and only if B has a duty to A to x.

Thus innocent human persons (=A) have a right in the sense of a claim right to life if and only if innocent human persons (=A) have a right that all other persons (=B) have a duty to innocent human persons (=A) to forbear intentionally killing them (=x). In other words, the right of innocent human persons to life, if genuine, means that all other persons have an obligation or duty not to kill them intentionally. Applying this argument to unborn children, we can say: unborn children have a strict right or claim right to life if and only if unborn children (=A) have a right that their mothers and other persons (=B) have a duty to unborn children to forbear aborting them, i.e., intentionally killing them (=x). This right is genuine because all persons, including mothers, have a strict obligation or duty to forbear intentionally killing innocent human persons, and abortion is the intentional killing of an innocent human person.

What of the alleged “right” of a woman to an abortion? Expressed as a three-term relationship between two persons and a specifiable action, we see that the alleged right is really a “liberty” claimed by women. It can be put generally as follows: B (=a person, group of persons, etc.) has a liberty relative to A (=a person, a group of persons, etc.) to x (=some specifiable act), if and only if A has no claim right that B should not x.

Translating a woman's alleged “right” to an abortion into this language we have the following: a woman (= B ) has a liberty relative to the unborn baby (= A ) intentionally to abort it (= x ) if and only if the unborn baby (= A ) has no claim right that the woman (= B ) should not abort it (= x ). But the unborn has the claim right that his or her mother (and others) forbear from aborting it. Consequently, the liberty (and not right) claimed by women to abort is spurious.

Chapter 7 on the wrongness of abortion goes into a minute analysis of many arguments proposed by defenders of abortion to show how specious they are; Kaczor in particular devotes great attention to two analogies used by Judith Jarvis Thomson in her celebrated 1971 article on the rights and wrongs of abortion. But his critique of her reasoning in my judgment is far inferior to the majestic rebuttal of Thomson's entire article by John Finnis in his “Rights and Wrongs of Abortion: A Reply to Judith Jarvis Thomson,” published in 1972 in the same journal in which Thomson's ludicrous essay appeared. Moreover, Kaczor makes no reference whatsoever, either in his text or bibliography, to this masterful article. Kaczor's analyses of some bad arguments to justify abortion are interesting, but they do not develop in any way the great arguments that show why abortion is always wrong.

Other weaknesses are present but not too serious. Moreover, despite the serious weaknesses noted, Kaczor's book is exceptionally valuable and makes a great contribution to the abortion debate.

1 Lee refers to Leslie Arey, Developmental Anatomy , 7th ed. (Philadelphia: W.B. Saunders, 1974); William Larsen, Human Embryology (UK: Churchill, Livingstone, 1993); and Keith Moore, Before We Are Born (Philadelphia: W.B. Saunders, 1998).

2 Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002.

3 Thomas Cavanaugh, “The Intended/Foreseen Distinction's Ethical Relevance,” Philosophical Papers 25:3 (1996): 179–188.

4 Kaczor refers to their article, “‘Direct’ and ‘Indirect’: A Reply to Critics of Our Action Theory,” Thomist 65 (2001): 1–44.

5 Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Donum vitae (Instruction on Respect for Human Life in Its Origin and on the Dignity of Procreation, Replies to Certain Questions of the Day) (1987), n. II.A.1, emphasis added, http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_19870222_respect-for-human-life_en.html .

6 Pope John Paul II, Centesimus annus (On the Hundredth Anniversary of Rerum Novarum ) (1991), n. 47, http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_01051991_centesimus-annus_en.html .

7 Cleveland/New York: Corpus Books, 1972.

8 John Finnis, Natural Law and Natural Rights (Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press, at the Clarendon Press, 1980), 199–205.

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2.5: Common Arguments about Abortion (Nathan Nobis and Kristina Grob)

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11 Common Arguments about Abortion Nathan Nobis and Kristina Grob 27

1 Introduction

Abortion is often in the news. In the course of writing this essay in early 2019, Kentucky, Mississippi, Ohio, Georgia, Alabama and Missouri passed legislation to outlaw and criminalize abortions starting at six to eight weeks in pregnancy, with more states following. Federal law, however, generally permits abortions, so it is unclear what the legal outcome here will be.

Abortion is a political issue – with different political parties tending to have different perspectives on the issue – because abortion is a moral or ethical issue. (These two words mean the same thing).

Some believe that abortions are typically morally permissible , or not wrong , and so believe that abortions should be legal. If doing something isn’t wrong, it shouldn’t be illegal: criminalizing actions that aren’t wrong is a form of injustice.

Other believe that abortion is morally wrong, that it’s often wrong, maybe nearly always or even always .

Some people argue that even though they believe abortion is wrong, it should remain legal: after all, if every morally wrong action was illegal, we would all be in jail! Seriously though, there are many actions that are morally wrong, even really hurtful, that the government shouldn’t try to prevent or punish. (You can supply the potential examples to make the point). They might also think that, for a variety of other reasons, their personal moral views on the issues shouldn’t be made into law for all.

Others argue that abortions are wrong and should be illegal. What types of wrongdoing should be illegal? This question isn’t easy to answer: it’s abstract and general. One answer is that seriously, extremely wrong actions should be illegal . This might seem plausible, since many illegal actions are seriously wrong, but since there are other very wrong actions that shouldn’t be illegal, this answer isn’t perfect.

2 Defining “Abortion”

Abortion might personally affect you or someone you know: you or a partner, spouse, relative or friend may have had an abortion, have considered abortion, or will have an abortion. But what is an abortion? There are a number of common definitions, some of which are better and others which are worse:

Definition 1 : An abortion is the murder of an unborn baby or child .

Definition 2 : An abortion is the intentional termination of a fetus to end a pregnancy.

Definition 3: An abortion is the intentional killing of a fetus to end a pregnancy.

Definition 3 is best. We’ll explain why after we show the problems with the first two definitions.

2.1 “Murdering Babies”

Definition 1 is common with certain groups of people, but even people who think abortion is wrong should reject it.

“Murder” means “wrongful killing,” and so this definition implies that abortion is wrong by definition , which it isn’t. This definition means that to know that abortion is wrong, we’d just need to reflect on the meaning of the word, and not give any reasons to think this. Murder is wrong by definition, but to know that any particular killing is murder, we need arguments. (Compare someone who calls the death penalty murder : we know it’s killing, but is it wrongful killing? We can’t just appeal to the definition of “murder”: we need arguments that this is wrongful killing). This definition also means that someone who claims that abortion is not wrong says that “Wrongful killing is not wrong,” which makes no sense. We can even call this a “question-begging” definition, since it assumes that abortion is wrong, which can’t be assumed . So this definition is problematic, even if abortion is wrong.

Definition 1 also describes fetuses as “babies” or “children.” While people are usually free to use whatever words how they want, people can say things that are false: calling something something doesn’t mean it’s really that thing. And the beginnings of something are usually not that thing: a pile of lumber and supplies is not a house; fabric, buttons and thread are not a shirt, and an embryo or early fetus is not a baby or child. So it’s false and misleading to call embryos and early fetuses “babies” or “children.”

Defining abortion in terms of “babies” seems to again result in a “question-begging” definition that assumes that abortion is wrong, since it is widely and correctly believed that it’s wrong to kill babies. We understand, however, that it’s wrong to kill babies because we think about born babies who are conscious and feeling and have other baby-like characteristics: these are the babies we have in mind when we think about the wrongness of killing babies, not early fetuses. Describing early fetuses as “babies” characterizes them either as something they are not or, at least, assumes things that need to argued for, which is misleading, both factually (in terms of what fetuses are like) and morally (insofar as it’s assumed that the rules about how babies should be treated clearly and straightforwardly apply to, say, embryos).

Part of the problem with this definition is that terms like “babies” and “children” encourage strong emotional responses. Babies and children are associated with value-laden terms such as innocence , vulnerability , preciousness , cuteness , and more. When we refer to unborn human beings as fetuses , some people become defensive because they see the word “fetus” as cold and sterile. But “fetus” is merely a helpful, and accurate, name for a stage of development, as is “baby,” “child,” “adolescent,” and “adult.” Distinguishing different stages of human development doesn’t commit anyone to a position on abortion, but it does help us understand what an abortion is .

In sum, defining abortion in terms of “murdering babies” is a bad definition: it misleads and assumes things it shouldn’t. Even those who think that abortion is wrong should not accept it.

2.2 “Termination”

The second definition describes abortion as an intentional action. This is good since a pregnant woman does not “have an abortion” if her pregnancy ends because of, say, a car accident. And “spontaneous abortions” or miscarriages are not intentional actions that can be judged morally: they just happen.

Definitions, however, are supposed to be informative, and the vague word “termination” doesn’t inform. If someone had literally no idea what an abortion was, it would be fair for them to ask what’s exactly involved in a “termination” of a pregnancy. A discussion between persons A and B – who knows nothing about abortion – might go like this:

“There is a pregnant woman (or girl) who does not want to have a baby, a living baby, obviously. And so we are going to do something to something insider her – that is developing into that living baby – so she does not have that baby. The action we are going to do is the ‘termination.’”

“ That something inside her, developing into that living baby, it is living? ”

“Yes. It started from a living egg and sperm cell.”

“So you are making something living not living , right? That sounds like killing something, right?”

Person B’s reasoning seems correct: abortions do involve killing. The word “termination” obscures that fact and so makes for an unclear definition. This doesn’t make the definition wrong ; to “terminate” something means to end it in some way , and abortion ends the development of a fetus. But it doesn’t say how abortion ends that development and so is not ideal.

Why might someone accept this definition? Probably because they are reasoning this way:

Killing is wrong. So if abortion is killing, then it’s wrong. But I don’t believe that abortion is wrong, or I am unsure that abortion is wrong, so I don’t want to call it a ‘killing,’ since that means it’s wrong.

The problem here is the first step. Not all killing is wrong . Lots of killing is perfectly fine and raises no moral issues at all: killing mold, killing bacteria, killing plants, killing fleas, killing random cells and tissues (even ones that are human, say cheek cells or skin cells), and more. We don’t even need to observe that it’s sometimes not wrong to kill adult human beings to make the point that not all killing is wrong.

This means that it’s not problematic to define abortion in terms of “killing.” The important questions then are, “Is abortion wrongful killing, or killing that’s not wrong?” and “When, if ever, might it be wrongful killing and when, if ever, might it be permissible killing? And why ?”

2.3 “Killing”

A final definition understands abortion in terms of an intentional killing of a fetus to end a pregnancy . This definition is accurate , informative since it tells us how the fetus would be “terminated”, and morally-neutral : it doesn’t assume that the killing involved in abortions is not wrong or that it’s wrong. This is a good definition. 28

3 Why Most Abortions Occur

The Guttmacher “Fact Sheet” 29 provides an overview of the research on why abortions occur and other relevant information:

This information suggests, at least, that if women were economically better off, had better access to affordable child-care and other forms of support, and had ready access to more reliable forms of contraception, there would likely be fewer abortions.

4 Bad Arguments: “Question-Begging” Arguments & “Everyday” Arguments

We’ll now discuss some commonly given arguments about abortion that, unfortunately, are rather poor.

4.1 “Question-begging” Arguments

Many common arguments about abortion are what’s called “question-begging,” which means the reason given for the conclusion assumes that conclusion. This means that you wouldn’t accept the reason as a good reason to believe the conclusion unless you already believed that conclusion! This is circular reasoning, and arguments like this are always bad.

4.1.1 “Against” Abortion:

Many common arguments against abortion are question begging. Here are some:

Abortion – killing fetuses to end pregnancies – is wrong because:

These premises all assume that abortion is wrong. To explain:

People would believe these claims only if they already believed abortion is wrong, so these claims should not sway anyone who wants to think critically about the issues.

4.1.2 “For” Abortion:

People who think abortion should be allowed also sometimes give question-begging arguments. Here are a few:

Abortion is not wrong because:

These premises likewise assume their conclusions. To explain:

Question-begging arguments are common, on many issues – not just abortion, and they should be rejected, by everyone, always.

4.2 “Everyday” Arguments

Now we will discuss some other common arguments, that you might often hear or read about, that are also poor but often not because they are question-begging. We’ll begin with some arguments against abortion.

4.2.1 “Against” Abortion

4.2.1.1 “Abortion ends a life.”

People often ask, “When does life begin?” Some people wonder if fetuses are “alive,” or when they become “life.” Some argue abortion is wrong because “life begins at conception,” whereas those who support abortion sometimes respond that “fetuses aren’t even alive!” There are a lot of debates here, and to get past them, we need to ask what is meant by alive, living or a life .

This is often considered a “deep” question, but it’s not. Consider this: are eggs (in women) alive? Are sperm cells alive? Yes to both, and so when a sperm fertilizes an egg, what results is a biologically living thing. Above, we defined abortion as a type of killing and, of course, you can only kill living things. So, yes, fetuses are alive, biologically alive , from conception: they are engaged in the types of life processes reviewed on page 1 of any biology textbook.

Some people think that fetuses being alive shows that abortion is wrong, and so they enthusiastically argue that fetuses are biologically alive. Some who think that abortion is not wrong try to argue that fetuses are not even alive. These responses suggest concern with an argument like this:

The second premise, however, is obviously false: uncontroversial examples show it. Mold, bacteria, mosquitos and plants are biologically alive, but they aren’t wrong to kill. So, just as acknowledging that abortion involves killing doesn’t mean that abortion is wrong, recognizing that biological life begins at conception doesn’t mean that abortion is wrong either.

Now, perhaps people really mean something like “morally significant life” or “life with rights,” but that’s not people what say: if that’s what they mean, they should say that.

4.2.1.2 “Abortion kills babies and children.”

Classifying fetuses as babies or children obscures any potentially relevant moral differences between, say, a 6-week old fetus and a 6-day old baby or 6-year old child. This claim assumes that fetuses – at any stage of development – and babies are the same sort of entity. This claim involves loaded emotional language, is inaccurate and is question-begging, as we discussed above in the section on definitions: this saying doesn’t contribute to a good argument.

4.2.1.3 “Abortion is murder.”

Murder is a term for a specific kind of killing. As a moral term, it refers to especially wrongful killing. As a legal term, it refers to intentional killing that is both unlawful and malicious. Since abortion is legal in the US, most abortions cannot be legally classified as murder because they are not illegal or unlawful. Moreover, abortions don’t seem to be done with malicious intent. When people claim that abortion is murder, what they seem to mean is either that abortion should be re-classified as murder or that abortion is wrong , or both. Either way, arguments are needed to support that, not question-begging slogans.

4.2.1.4 “Abortion kills innocent beings.”

Fetuses are often described as “innocent,” meaning that they have done nothing wrong to deserve being killed. Since killing anyone innocent is wrong, this suggests that abortion is wrong. “Innocence,” however, seems to be a concept that only applies to beings that can do wrong and choose not to. Since fetuses can’t do anything – they especially cannot do anything wrong that would make them “guilty” – the concept of innocence does not seem to apply to them. So saying that banning abortion would “protect the innocent” is inaccurate since abortion doesn’t kill “innocent” beings: the concept of innocence just doesn’t apply.

4.2.1.5 “The Bible says abortion is wrong.”

People often appeal to religion to justify their moral views. Some say that God thinks abortion is wrong, but it’s a fair question how they might know this, especially since others claim to know that God doesn’t think that. In reply, it is sometimes said that the Bible says abortion is wrong (and that’s how we know what God thinks).

But the Bible doesn’t say that abortion is wrong: it doesn’t discuss abortion at all. There is a commandment against killing , but, as our discussion above makes clear, this requires interpretation about what and who is wrong to kill: presumably the Bible doesn’t mean that killing mold or bacteria or plants is wrong. And there are verses (Exodus 21:22-24) that, on some translations, suggest that fetuses lack the value of born persons, since penalties for damage to each differ. This coincides with common Jewish views on the issue, that the needs and rights of the mother outweigh any the fetus might have.

However any verses are best interpreted, they still don't show that abortion is wrong. This is because the Bible is not always a reliable guide to morality, since there are troubling verses that seem to require killing people for trivial “crimes,” allow enslaving people (and beating them), require obeying all government officials and more. And Jesus commanded loving your neighbor as yourself, loving your enemies and taking care of orphans, immigrants and refugees, and offered many other moral guidelines that many people regard as false. 30 Simple moral arguments from the Bible assume that that if the Bible says an action is wrong, then it really is wrong (and if the Bible says something’s not wrong, it’s not wrong ), and both premises don’t seem to be literally true.

This all suggests that people sometimes appeal to the Bible in selective and self-serving ways: they come to the Bible with their previously-held moral assumptions and seek to find something in the Bible to justify them.

There is an interesting Biblical connection here worth mentioning though. Some argue that if women who want abortions are prevented from having them, that forces them to remain pregnant and give birth and that this is like forcing women to be like the “Good Samaritan” who went out of his way, at expense to himself, to help a stranger in great need (Luke 10:25-37). (The analogy is imperfect, as analogies always are).

The problem is in no other area of life is anyone forced to be a Good Samaritan like a pregnant woman would: e.g., you can’t be forced to donate an organ to anyone in need (even to your child or parent); you can’t even be forced to donate your organs after you are dead! Nobody other than pregnant women would be forced by the government – under threat of imprisonment or worse – to use their body to help sustain someone else’s life. It is unfair to require women to be Good Samaritans but allow the rest of us to be like the “priest” and “Levite” in the story who helped nobody.

Nevertheless, it’s important to remember that laws should not be based on any particular religions. If you are not, say, a Hindu, or a Buddhist, or a Rastafarian, you probably don’t want laws based solely on one of those religion’s values. Laws should be religiously-neutral; on that we all should agree.

4.2.1.6 “Abortion stops a beating heart.”

This claim, if given as an argument, assumes that stopping a beating heart is wrong . The assumption, however, is just obviously untrue: e.g., during open heart surgery, surgeons temporarily stop the patient’s heart so that repair can be made to the still heart: they would permanently stop that heart if they replace it with an artificial heart. If there were somehow an independently beating heart, attached to nobody, that heart wouldn’t be wrong to stop. Whether a heart is wrong to stop or not depends on who is around that heart and their value or rights, not anything about that heart by itself. Finally, embryos and early fetuses do not even have hearts , as critics of recent “heartbeat” bills have observed! (The heart fully develops much later in pregnancy.)

If, however, this widely expressed concern about a heartbeat isn't meant to be taken literally, but is merely a metaphor or an emotional appeal, we submit that these are inappropriate for serious issues like this one.

4.2.1.7 “How would you like it if . .?”

Some ask, “How would you like it if your mother had had an abortion?” Others tell stories of how their mother almost had an abortion and how they are grateful she didn’t. Questions and stories like these sometimes persuade, but they shouldn’t. Consider some other questions:

All sorts of actions would have prevented each of our existences – if your parents had acted differently in many ways, you wouldn’t be here to entertain the question: at best, someone else would be 31 – but these actions aren’t wrong.

Some might reply that if you had been murdered as a baby, you wouldn’t be here to discuss it. True, but that baby was conscious, had feelings, and had a perspective on the world that ended in being murdered: an early fetus is not like that. We can empathetically imagine what it might have been like for that murdered child; we can’t do that with a never-been-conscious fetus, since there’s no perspective to imagine.

In sum, these are some common arguments given against abortion. They aren’t good. Everyone can do better.

4.2.2 Common Arguments “For” Abortion

Many common arguments “for” abortion are also weak. This is often because they simply don’t engage the concerns of people who oppose abortion. Consider these often-heard claims:

4.2.2.1 “Women have a right to do whatever they want with their bodies . . .”

Autonomy , your ability to make decisions about matters that profoundly affect your own life, is very important: it’s a core concern in medical ethics. But autonomy has limits: your autonomy doesn’t, say, justify murdering an innocent person , which is what some claim abortion is. The slogan that “women can do what they want . .” does not engage that claim or any arguments given in its favor, so it’s inadequate.

4.2.2.2 “People who oppose abortion are just trying to control women.”

They might be trying to do this. But they might be trying to ban abortion because they believe that abortion is wrong and should be illegal . Speculations about motives don’t engage or critique any arguments they might give to think that. (If you doubt that thinking critically about arguments and evidence here would do any good, do they have any better ideas that might do more good?).

4.2.2.3 “Men shouldn’t make decisions about matters affecting women.”

Insofar as women profoundly disagree on these issues, some women must be making bad decisions about matters affecting women: all women can’t be correct on the issues. And some men can understand that some arguments (endorsed sometimes by both women and men) are bad arguments and give good arguments on the issues. Someone’s sex or gender has little to no bearing on whether they can make good arguments about matters that affect them or anyone else. Furthermore, the existence of transgender men who have given birth further undermines the thought that one sex or gender is apt to have more correct views here.

4.2.2.4 “Women and girls will die if abortion isn’t allowed.”

This is true . However, this fact is apt to not be persuasive to some people who think that abortion is wrong: they will respond, “If someone dies because they are doing something wrong like having an abortion , that’s ‘on them,’ not those who are trying to prevent that wrong.” Observing that women will die if abortions are outlawed doesn’t engage any arguments that abortion is wrong or give much a reason to think that abortion is not wrong. Again, this type of engagement is necessary for progress on these issues.

In sum, while we agree that people who think that abortion is generally not morally wrong and should be legal are correct , they sometimes don’t offer very good reasons to think this, just like the opponents of abortion. An analysis of the more nuanced reasons in favor of abortion provided by philosophers will yield proper support for this viewpoint.

For Review and Discussion:

1. Do the reasons that people get abortions matter for its moral permissibility? Why or why not?

2. Describe the common arguments against abortion and assess them. Are they good or bad arguments? Do they make assumptions or claims that are problematic? Do the reasons provided actually provide evidence and reasons to oppose abortion?

3. Describe the common arguments for abortion and assess them. Are they good or bad arguments? Do they make assumptions or claims that are problematic? Do the reasons provided actually give evidence and reasons to support abortion?

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In This Article Expand or collapse the "in this article" section Abortion

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Abortion by Andrzej Kulczycki LAST REVIEWED: 07 January 2022 LAST MODIFIED: 24 May 2017 DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199756797-0090

An abortion refers to the termination of a pregnancy. It can be induced (see Definitions, Terminology, and Reference Resources ) through a pharmacological or a surgical procedure, or it may be spontaneous (also called miscarriage ). Both in the United States and globally, approximately one-fifth of all known pregnancies end in abortion, which is currently one of the safest procedures in medicine when performed by a trained professional in hygienic conditions using modern methods. In 2016, it was estimated that about 56 million abortions were induced worldwide each year from 2010 to 2014, corresponding to about 35 abortions per 1,000 women of childbearing age. However, it was previously estimated that about 21.6 million abortions performed annually were unsafe, causing some 47,000 maternal deaths or 13 percent of all maternal deaths. Abortion-related mortality may have since fallen, but multiple challenges with measurement and data quality persist. The incidence of abortion may be reduced through good access to a range of effective contraceptive methods, sex education, and appropriate support for women who want to have a child. Historically, women who underwent abortions risked their personal health and social standing. In the 20th century, this situation changed slowly in many countries as abortion procedures became safer and efforts to legalize abortion gained momentum. Nevertheless, abortion is often a controversial matter of health and social policy due to divergent views on such matters as when human life begins, women’s roles and rights, and the role of government in individuals’ private lives. This entry reflects the broad scope of public health issues concerning the demography of abortion, its epidemiology, legality, and abortion-related methods. It also provides a collection of resources on postabortion care. This article first briefly reviews the terminology used for different types of abortion and outlines resources that detail the history of abortion as well as its general public heath contours in the United States and the world. Less attention is paid to the ethical aspects of abortion, arguments for or against the practice, different cultural or religious views on abortion, and public or political aspects of conflict concerning abortion.

Although recent textbooks on the public health aspects of abortion are lacking, Faúndes and Barzelatto 2006 provides an accessible account of many pertinent issues written in plain language for nonspecialists. Singh, et al. 2009 summarizes recent trends in abortion incidence, with a focus on unsafe abortion, as well as changes in legality, safety, and accessibility of abortion services worldwide. Sedgh, et al. 2016 presents the most recent abortion estimates for major world regions. Paul, et al. 2009 offers an informative text written primarily for clinicians on the provision of abortion care. A well-referenced handbook, World Health Organization 2012 (WHO), gives guidance to health professionals inside and outside governments who are working to reduce poor maternal health on the many ways of ensuring access to abortion care as allowed by law. Several reference guides explore the evolution of the US abortion debate from various viewpoints and may assist those working in the medical, social science, historical, legal, and public health fields. McBride 2007 includes a collection of biographical sketches, chronology, and excerpts from key statutes and court cases that have pushed the abortion controversy into the public arena, and Rose 2008 provides a selection of forty-one primary source documents from medical workers, judges, feminists, religious leaders, and politicians from the 19th century through 2007.

Faúndes, Anibal, and José S. Barzelatto. 2006. The human drama of abortion: A global search for consensus . Nashville: Vanderbilt Univ. Press.

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This book includes overviews of why women have abortions, the scale of the practice, consequences of unsafe abortions, effective interventions, values, and conclusions about what can be done to reach a necessary and practical societal consensus.

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McBride, Dorothy E. 2007. Abortion in the United States: A reference handbook . Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO.

This reference volume covers multiple aspects of how abortion is considered in the United States. The guide also provides commentary on major Supreme Court cases and state laws regulating abortion policy as well as other background information.

Paul, Maureen, E. Steve Lichtenberg, Lynn Borgatta, David A. Grimes, Phillip G. Stubblefield, and Mitchell D. Creinin, eds. 2009. Management of unintended and abnormal pregnancy: Comprehensive abortion care . Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.

DOI: 10.1002/9781444313031 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This widely used evidence-based reference text in abortion care discusses abortion methods, pre- and postprocedure care, the management of ectopic and other abnormal pregnancies (including the risks of multiple pregnancies resulting from assisted reproductive technologies), and public health aspects of abortion service delivery.

Rose, Melody. 2008. Abortion: A documentary and reference guide . Westport, CT: Greenwood.

This reference work carries primary documents and commentary on the public health situation and sociopolitical controversy concerning abortion in the United States. Excerpts are also included from popular women’s self-help books, memoirs of early abortion providers, important legal papers, and the text of Pope Paul VI’s 1968 encyclical, Humanae Vitae .

Sedgh, Gilda, Jonathan Bearak, Susheela Singh, Akirinola Bankole, Anna Popinchalk, Bela Ganatra, et al. 2016. Abortion incidence between 1990 and 2014: Global, regional, and subregional levels and trends. Lancet 388.10041: 258–267.

DOI: 10.1016/S0140-6736(16)30380-4 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

The most recent update on abortion levels and trends worldwide, including for countries and major regions in which abortion is legally permitted and generally available, as well as for those in which it is not. Available online for purchase or by subscription.

Singh, Susheela, Deirdre Wulf, Rubina Hussain, Akinrinola Bankole, and Gilda Sedgh. 2009. Abortion worldwide: A decade of uneven progress . New York: Guttmacher Institute.

This report reviews changes in abortion incidence, legality, and safety, with greater attention paid to unsafe abortion and the situation in low-income countries. The report also examines the relation among unintended pregnancy, contraception, and abortion. Also available in Spanish .

World Health Organization. 2012. Safe abortion: Technical and policy guidance for health systems . 2d ed. Geneva, Switzerland: World Health Organization.

This updated and expanded version of the report gives guidance to health professionals and others on actions to ensure the provision of safe, quality abortion services as allowed by law. It also provides an overview of the public health challenges, including clinical aspects of care, health system issues, and the legal, regulatory, and policy environment for improving the quality and accessibility of care.

Definitions of abortion vary across and within countries as well as among different institutions. Language used to refer to abortion often also reflects societal and political opinions and not only scientific knowledge ( Grimes and Gretchen 2010 ). Popular use of the word abortion implies a deliberate pregnancy termination, whereas a miscarriage is used to refer to spontaneous fetal loss when the fetus is not viable (i.e., not yet unable to survive independently outside the womb). Spontaneous abortions may account for up to one in four pregnancies. Most occur in the first two weeks after conception, typically due to embryonic malformations or chromosomal abnormalities, and before a woman is aware that she is pregnant ( Wilcox 2010 ). Induced abortion is the deliberate termination of pregnancy before viability (which may vary from twenty to twenty-eight weeks’ gestation, but medical advances now imply that viability can be generally assumed at about twenty-four weeks). An abortion can be induced for medical reasons or because of an elective decision to end the pregnancy. In an incomplete abortion, parts of the fetus or placental tissue are retained in the uterus and can result in hemorrhage, intense pain, uterine infection, and death if left untreated. An unsafe abortion may have adverse consequences for women’s health because it is performed by persons lacking the necessary skills in an environment lacking the minimal medical standards, or both. Many electronic resources maintained by various nonprofit organizations provide helpful and free downloadable materials on different aspects of abortion. Health professional organizations with useful websites include the Association of Reproductive Health Professionals , whose members provide reproductive health services and education, conduct reproductive health research, and influence reproductive health policy. Another authoritative source is the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists , whose 52,000 members comprise over 90 percent of US board-certified obstetrician-gynecologists. The broad international focus of the WHO’s Sexual and Reproductive Health division means that many of its materials relate to all major parts of the world. Gynuity Health Projects and Ipas conduct research and technical assistance focused on improving and expanding access to methods, including safe and more acceptable abortion services that reduce maternal mortality and morbidity. The Guttmacher Institute conducts research and policy analysis related to abortion in the United States and internationally and makes much of its information available online.

American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists .

This website includes various publications and resource guides on abortion as well as on many other aspects of women’s health care.

Association of Reproductive Health Professionals .

This website carries links to featured research, clinical publications and resources, and news on abortion as well as vetted links to organizations for patients seeking abortion information.

Grimes, David A., and Stuart B. Gretchen. 2010. Abortion jabberwocky: The need for better terminology. Contraception 81.2: 93–96.

DOI: 10.1016/j.contraception.2009.09.005 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This article is a lively critique of widely used but imprecise, misleading, and ambiguous terminology associated with how abortion is considered in both the lay and the professional literature. The authors discuss a number of such problematic terms in the public health, medical, and social science fields. Available online for purchase or by subscription.

Guttmacher Institute .

The Guttmacher Institute makes available online a range of resources, including fact sheets, media kits, state policy briefs, reports, and policy and research articles related to abortion.

Gynuity Health Projects .

Gynuity Health Projects maintains a website that includes links to various resources and publications that it has developed for health-care providers, policy makers, and advocates.

HRP: Sexual and Reproductive Health .

The WHO’s special program for research on human reproduction, HRP, conducts research to help eliminate unsafe abortion. HRP’s website makes the agency’s publications and research findings available.

Ipas provides a number of resources related to abortion, both for health-care providers and researchers, that are accessible through its website.

Wilcox, Allen J. 2010. Fertility and pregnancy: An epidemiologic perspective . New York: Oxford Univ. Press.

Written by an epidemiologist, this informative textbook on reproduction and pregnancy includes a discussion of early pregnancy loss.

Abortion and infanticide were historically used after conception to control fertility. Riddle 1992 documents how women from ancient Egyptian times to the 15th century relied on an extensive pharmacopoeia of herbal abortifacients and contraceptives as well as manipulation to regulate fertility. Himes 1963 outlines the widespread knowledge of such ancient and premodern practices and of their menstrual-regulating qualities, which herbalists, laywomen, and health healers across the world handed down for generations. However, knowledge of these practices, many risky and ineffective, gradually became viewed with more suspicion by medical and pharmaceutical personnel keen to assert their professional role and interests. Mohr 1978 reviews the history of abortion in the United States since the colonial days, with a focus on the enactment of restrictive 19th-century laws at the state level. The author further examines how the medical establishment was far more instrumental than religious activism in pushing through the late-19th-century wave of antiabortion legislation, even though it became among its foremost advocates a century later. Stringent antiabortion laws were also passed in Europe in the 19th century. Both Gordon 2007 and Joffe 1995 report how safe abortions were performed for some women by highly skilled laypersons and physicians through the 20th century, when attitudes slowly became more liberal. Tribe 1990 provides one of the more widely cited surveys of the historical, legal, and moral issues related to abortion. By the 1970s, abortion had been legalized in Japan and most European countries. In the United States, the 1973 Supreme Court ruling Roe v. Wade permitted abortions during the first three months of pregnancy and with increasing restrictions thereafter. The Court subsequently reaffirmed its landmark decision despite numerous legal challenges, although in 1976 the US Congress passed the Hyde Amendment, which barred the use of Medicaid funds for abortion except for all but the most extreme circumstances (rape, incest, or if the pregnant woman’s life was threatened). Abortion-related mortality fell greatly after nationwide legalization as documented by numerous sources, including Coble, et al. 1992 . However, conflict over abortion continues, with many of its underpinnings described in Luker 1984 . This authoritative study avoids common negative stereotypes and shows that the contrasting worldviews of pro-choice and pro-life activists are rooted in different sets of values and ideas about women’s roles.

Coble, Yank D., E. Harvey Estes, C. Alvin Head, et al. 1992. Induced termination of pregnancy before and after Roe v. Wade : Trends in the mortality and morbidity of women. Journal of the American Medical Association 268.22: 3231–3239.

DOI: 10.1001/jama.1992.03490220075032 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This article compares the mortality and morbidity of women who terminated their pregnancy before the 1973 Supreme Court decision with mortality and morbidity after Roe v. Wade . Available online for purchase or by subscription.

Gordon, Linda. 2007. The moral property of women: A history of birth control politics in America . Rev. ed. Urbana: Univ. of Illinois Press.

An updated edition of a widely cited history of the intense struggles over reproductive rights, including abortion, that have taken place over the past 150 years in America as seen from the perspective of women who are seeking sexual and reproductive self-determination.

Himes, Norman E. 1963. Medical history of contraception . New York: Gamut.

Written by an anthropologist, this significant study provides extensive documentation of the use of birth control from preliterate cultures to the 1930s and reports that many earlier societies relied on abortion and infanticide. Originally published in 1936.

Joffe, Carole E. 1995. Doctors of conscience: The struggle to provide abortion before and after Roe v. Wade . Boston: Beacon.

In contrast to other accounts, this study of the experiences of physicians is placed within a discussion of important health policy issues. It also examines how the medical profession has marginalized abortion services before and since their legalization as well as the role it could play in improving abortion services.

Luker, Kristin. 1984. Abortion and the politics of motherhood . Berkeley: Univ. of California Press.

Based on detailed fieldwork, this work is a detailed sociological examination of the different perceptions of abortion and related issues held by different groups of women.

Mohr, James C. 1978. Abortion in America: The origins and evolution of national policy, 1800–1900 . New York: Oxford Univ. Press.

An influential and heavily cited history of abortion in 19th-century America. This study also highlights the role of regularly trained physicians in the movement to criminalize abortion.

Riddle, John M. 1992. Contraception and abortion from the ancient world to the Renaissance . Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press.

This study collates disparate historical sources of knowledge about fertility control and how this female-centered, oral culture was passed on until it was lost in the Early Modern period due to the organization of medicine. Physicians’ ties with folk traditions were broken as they became increasingly trained in universities, where fertility regulation was not part of the curriculum.

Tribe, Laurence H. 1990. Abortion: The clash of absolutes . New York: Norton.

This work is a review by a well-known constitutional law scholar of the historical, legal, and moral issues related to abortion both in the United States and in different parts of the world.

Laws determine the official availability of abortion services and also their safety. Changes in abortion legislation monitored by the United Nations show modest increases for the period 1996–2013 in the number of countries allowing early abortion for social or economic reasons, or on request, but only about one-third permit it on such grounds ( United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs 2014 ). Kulczycki 1999 analyzes the forces shaping the abortion debate and controversy globally and how these have shaped abortion trends and policies beyond Western liberal democracies. Cook, et al. 2014 examines recent transnational legal developments. Although the risk of death and injury to women seeking abortion is always present in countries where abortion is illegal, safe abortion services are readily accessible for those able to pay for them, as in nearly all of Latin America, the region of the world with the most restrictive abortion laws ( Kulczycki 2011 ). Two well-documented case studies demonstrate how legalizing abortion increases the safety of the procedure. When Romania banned abortion and contraceptives in 1966, maternal deaths soared, but after the procedure was legalized again in 1990 and access to modern contraceptives improved, they fell sharply ( David 1999 ; Stephenson, et al. 1992 ). After abortion became available on the request of a pregnant woman in South Africa in 1997 and postabortion care and family planning services improved, abortion-related deaths fell by 91 percent during the period 1994–2001, with steep declines in serious morbidity also observed ( Jewkes, et al. 2005 ). The actual implementation of laws and societal and cultural views on sexuality and reproduction, further condition access to abortion. India has more abortion-related deaths than any other country despite closely following the United Kingdom in allowing abortion on public health grounds. Poor and rural women are most likely to have clandestine procedures, often performed by untrained persons in unhygienic conditions at sites other than registered government institutions. Many women are not aware of the legal status of abortion and services are insufficient to meet the demand. In 1994, India banned prenatal testing when done solely to determine the sex of the fetus, but Jha, et al. 2011 shows that most of India’s population now lives in states where selective abortion of girls is common, especially for pregnancies after a first-born girl. The diffusion of safer, less costly abortion methods and ultrasound examination technology and the persistence of son preference in various South and East Asian societies have contributed to the rise of sex-selective abortion. However, normative changes have driven a reversal of this trend in South Korea.

Cook, Rebecca J., Joanna N. Erdman, and Bernard M. Dickens, eds. 2014. Abortion law in transnational perspective: Cases and controversies . Philadelphia: Univ. of Philadelphia Press.

This edited volume examines recent transnational legal developments, including judicial decisions, constitutional texts, and regulatory reforms of abortion law in a number of countries and regions.

David, Henry, ed. 1999. From abortion to contraception: A resource to public policies and reproductive behavior in central and eastern Europe from 1917 to the present . Westport, CT: Greenwood.

This edited work chronicles the interaction of public policies and private reproductive behavior in the twenty-eight formerly socialist countries of central and eastern Europe and the USSR successor states from 1917 to the present.

Jewkes, Rachel, Helen Rees, Kim Dickson, Heather Brown, and Jonathan Levin. 2005. The impact of age on the epidemiology of incomplete abortions in South Africa after legislative change . British Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology 112.3: 355–359.

DOI: 10.1111/j.1471-0528.2004.00422.x Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

A descriptive study using hospital data to show that legalization of abortion in South Africa reduced abortion mortality and morbidity, especially in younger women. Comparisons are drawn to an earlier study undertaken in 1994 before legislative change.

Jha, Prabhat, Maya A. Kesler, Rajesh Kumar, et al. 2011. Trends in selective abortions of girls in India: Analysis of nationally representative birth histories from 1990 to 2005 and census data from 1991 to 2011. Lancet 377.9781: 1921–1928.

DOI: 10.1016/S0140-6736(11)60649-1 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This study assesses sex ratios by birth order from 1990 to 2005 using nationally representative surveys and quantifies the totals of selective abortions of girls with census cohort data. Declines in the conditional sex ratio of second-order births after a firstborn girl are much greater in more educated mothers and in wealthier households. This is due to increased prenatal sex determination with subsequent selective abortion of female fetuses. Available online for purchase or by subscription.

Kulczycki, Andrzej. 1999. The abortion debate in the world arena . New York: Routledge.

DOI: 10.1057/9780230379183 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This book examines abortion trends and debate, reproductive behavior, and related public health considerations in three countries in particular (Kenya, Mexico, and Poland), seen as regional bellwethers of how abortion is treated, including within the policy-making process.

Kulczycki, Andrzej. 2011. Abortion in Latin America: Changes in practice, growing conflict, and recent policy developments. Studies in Family Planning 42.3: 199–220.

DOI: 10.1111/j.1728-4465.2011.00282.x Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This article is a regional analysis of the rapidly changing practice and context of abortion in Latin America, including legal and policy developments, and contrasting country situations. Available online for purchase or by subscription.

Stephenson, Patricia, Marsden Wagner, Mihaela Badea, and Florina Serbanescu. 1992. Commentary: The public health consequences of restricted induced abortion; Lessons from Romania . American Journal of Public Health 82.10: 1328–1331.

DOI: 10.2105/AJPH.82.10.1328 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This article reviews the public health consequences of restricted abortion in Romania, where the pronatalist policies of the Ceaucescu regime resulted in the highest maternal mortality rate in Europe and in thousands of unwanted children in institutions.

United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs. 2014. Abortion policies and reproductive health around the world . New York: United Nations.

The United Nations tracks changes in the legal status of induced abortion worldwide. Its most recent overview includes a tabulated summary of key reproductive health indicators and governments’ officially stated levels of concern and support for various reproductive health policies.

An estimated one in five pregnancies worldwide are aborted, but the incidence of abortion is known in detail only for those countries where abortion is legally permitted with few restrictions and official statistics are reasonably complete. Sedgh, et al. 2016 (cited under General Overviews ) provides a recent summary of these trends. Rossier 2003 and Singh, et al. 2010 review the range of estimation methodologies developed for use in contexts where abortion is legally restricted and where it remains a very sensitive issue. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention compiles annual numbers and basic characteristics of women obtaining abortions, such as its report for 2013 ( Jatlaoui, et al. 2016 ). However, these data are unavailable for some states and are of varying reliability for others in which reporting is not mandatory or is poorly enforced. A more complete count of the total number of abortions is available from the Guttmacher Institute based on its periodic census of abortion providers, with certain characteristics also available through its surveys of women having abortions. The US abortion rate fell to an estimated 15 abortions per 1,000 women aged 15–44 in 2014, primarily due to improved contraceptive use ( Jones and Jerman 2017 ). Both unintended pregnancy and abortion rates are higher among certain groups of women, typically including those under age thirty, in poverty, and from more disadvantaged racial and ethnic minority groups. The World Health Organization presents national, regional, and global estimates of unsafe abortion and associated mortality ( Åhman and Shah 2011 ). It also estimated that abortion-related deaths still account for about 8 percent of maternal mortality worldwide, although these deaths are often underreported ( Say, et al. 2014 ). Evidence from a diverse set of countries shows that, over time, abortion rates fall as levels of contraceptive use rise ( Marston and Cleland 2003 ). The highest abortion rates in the world are found in many former Soviet bloc republics, and Westoff 2005 reports how levels of abortion fell to a varying degree as the availability, accessibility, and quality of available contraceptive options improved. However, even widespread modern contraceptive use will not entirely eliminate abortions because no contraceptive works perfectly every time. Women have abortions for many reasons, most often because they feel unable in their current circumstances to fulfill their parental responsibilities as they would like or to provide the kind of family support they believe their children deserve ( Biggs, et al. 2013 ).

Åhman, Elisabeth, and Iqbal Shah. 2011. Unsafe abortion: Global and regional estimates of the incidence of unsafe abortion and associated mortality in 2008 . 6th ed. Geneva, Switzerland: World Health Organization.

The sixth update in a series of reports on the topic, with this round pertaining to 2008.

Biggs, M. Antonia, Heather Gould, and Diana G. Foster. 2013. Understanding why women seek abortions in the US . BMC Women’s Health 13:29.

DOI: 10.1186/1472-6874-13-29 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This study of 954 women recruited at thirty different abortion facilities across the United States identified eleven predominant themes, although most women reported multiple reasons for seeking an abortion, in common with previous studies.

Jatlaoui, Tara C., Alexander Ewing, Michele G. Mandel, et al. 2016. Abortion Surveillance—United States, 2013. Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report Surveillance Summaries 65.12: 1–44.

CDC’s surveillance system compiles information on legal induced abortions. More information is available online . This source provides the latest available annual assessment, which is also available online .

Jones, Rachel K., and Jenna Jerman. 2017. Abortion incidence and service availability in the United States, 2014. Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health 49.1: 3–14.

DOI: 10.1363/psrh.12015 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This report shows the long-term decline in US abortion incidence, which in 2014 fell below one million for the first time since abortion was legalized nationally in 1973. Available online for purchase or by subscription.

Marston, Cicely, and John Cleland. 2003. Relationships between contraception and abortion: A review of the evidence. International Family Planning Perspectives 29.1: 6–13.

DOI: 10.2307/3180995 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This article reviews data from countries with reliable information on both contraception and abortion. It also explores how the relationship between them may be mediated by the stability of levels of fertility.

Rossier, Clémentine. 2003. Estimating induced abortion rates: A review. Studies in Family Planning 34.2: 87–102.

DOI: 10.1111/j.1728-4465.2003.00087.x Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

The author describes the methodological requirements, advantages and disadvantages, and empirical records of eight methods used to estimate the frequency of abortion. Available online for purchase or by subscription.

Say, Lale, Doris Chou, Alison Gemmill, et al. 2014. Global causes of maternal death: A WHO systematic analysis. Lancet Global Health 2.6: e323–e333.

DOI: 10.1016/S2214-109X(14)70227-X Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This article develops and analyses global, regional, and subregional estimates of major causes of maternal death, including abortion, during 2003–09.

Singh, Susheela, Remez Lisa, and Alyssa Tartaglione, eds. 2010. Methodologies for estimating abortion incidence and abortion-related morbidity: A review . New York: Guttmacher Institute.

Based on a seminar convened on the topic by the International Union for the Scientific Study of Population, each of the fourteen chapters in this volume is available separately, along with the full report, online .

Westoff, Charles F. 2005. Recent trends in abortion and contraception in 12 countries . Calverton, MD: ORC Macro.

This report analyzes recent trends in abortion and contraception in twelve central Asian and eastern European countries where abortion had long been an important birth control method. All have experienced sharp declines in the number of children desired and in fertility rates, and most, but not all, have seen falling abortion and rising contraceptive prevalence rates.

Abortion is one of the safest procedures in medicine when conducted early in a pregnancy by a trained provider under hygienic conditions. Estimates show that for the United States the risk of death associated with childbirth is about fourteen times higher than that associated with all abortions ( Raymond and Grimes 2012 ) and would be even lower with improved prevention of unintended pregnancy and increased access to early abortion services ( Zane, et al. 2015 ). Paul, et al. 2009 (cited under General Overviews ) describes both surgical and medical methods of abortion. Vacuum aspiration is the preferred surgical method prior to twelve weeks’ gestation and the suction mechanism may be electric or manual (MVA). Dilatation and curettage (D&C or sharp curettage) carries higher risks and is now recommended by the WHO only when MVA is unavailable, although it remains performed for a variety of other gynecological reasons. A medical (or medication abortion) ends an early-term pregnancy (typically before nine weeks’ gestation) by pharmacological drugs. It involves a combination of mifepristone (an antiprogestogen, also known by its brand name, Mifeprex and previously as RU-486) followed by a prostaglandin, usually misoprostol, that causes uterine contractions. It is safe, effective, and acceptable to most women. Early abortion before nine weeks gestation with mifepristone/misoprostol combinations has replaced many surgical procedures. Although less effective, the use of misoprostol alone for abortion has increased throughout Latin America, reducing complications related to self-induced procedures and other unsafe abortions, thereby also decreasing the number of women admitted to hospitals ( Ipas 2010 ). In the United States, about one in nine abortions are performed in the second trimester, for which a very rare procedure, intact dilatation and extraction, was federally banned in 2003. Opponents labeled it “partial-birth abortion,” a term that remains in use in the vernacular but is not recognized medically ( Johnson, et al. 2005 ). Several hypothesized potential side-effects of abortion have been the subject of much controversy. Breast cancer and adverse mental health effects are two such disputed side effects. Abortion has been postulated to increase the risk of developing breast cancer, but the scientific consensus is that no such association exists (e.g., National Cancer Institute 2003– , Collaborative Group on Hormonal Factors in Breast Cancer 2004 ). Claims have also been made about the emotional effects of abortion, but these are largely benign, at least in countries where abortion is legal and safely performed ( Charles, et al. 2008 ). Also, postabortion syndrome is not a valid psychiatric or medical diagnosis ( Major, et al. 2008 ). Being denied an abortion may be associated with greater risk of initially experiencing adverse psychological outcomes than having an abortion, but outcomes for both groups eventually converge ( Biggs, et al. 2017 ).

Biggs, M. Antonia, Ushma D. Upadhyay, Charles E. McCulloch, et al. 2017. Women’s mental health and well-being 5 years after receiving or being denied an abortion: A prospective, longitudinal cohort study. JAMA Psychiatry 74.2: 169–178.

DOI: 10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2016.3478 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

Findings from a five-year longitudinal (“Turnaway”) study that examined mental health and other effects of receiving or being denied an abortion. Psychological well-being improved over time so that both groups of women eventually converged.

Charles, Vignetta E., Chelsea B. Polis, Srinivas K. Sridhara, and Robert W. Blum. 2008. Abortion and long term mental health outcomes: A systematic review of the evidence. Contraception 78.6: 436–450.

DOI: 10.1016/j.contraception.2008.07.005 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

Articles focused on the potential association between abortion and long-term mental health outcomes are rated for their methodological quality and appropriateness to explore the research question. Better quality studies suggest few, if any, differences between women who had abortions and their respective comparison groups in terms of mental health sequelae. Available online for purchase or by subscription.

Collaborative Group on Hormonal Factors in Breast Cancer. 2004. Breast cancer and abortion: Collaborative reanalysis of data from 53 epidemiological studies, including 83,000 women with breast cancer from 16 countries. Lancet 363.9414: 1007–1016.

DOI: 10.1016/S0140-6736(04)15835-2 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

A meta-analysis of available epidemiological evidence worldwide, this study shows no relation between induced abortion (or previous miscarriage) and the risk of subsequent breast cancer. Available online for purchase or by subscription.

Ipas. 2010. Misoprostol and medical abortion in Latin America and the Caribbean . Chapel Hill, NC: Ipas.

This report discusses how misoprostol, a proven medication for a variety of obstetric and gynecologic uses, is being increasingly used in Latin America, thereby reducing incomplete abortions and related mortality and morbidity.

Johnson, Timothy R. B., Lisa H. Harris, Vanessa K. Dalton, and Joel D. Howell. 2005. Language matters: Legislation, medical practice, and the classification of abortion procedures. Obstetrics & Gynecology 105.1: 201–204.

DOI: 10.1097/01.AOG.0000149803.31623.b0 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This article discusses changing medical practice concerning abortion, efforts to clarify and obfuscate medical language, and legislative attempts to keep up with such changes. Available online for purchase or by subscription.

Major, Brenda, Mark Appelbaum, Linda Beckman, Mary Ann Dutton, Nancy Felipe Russo, and Carolyn West. 2008. Report of the APA task force on mental health and abortion . Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

This report concludes that a first abortion does not lead to any increased risk of mental health problems. Evidence for multiple terminations is more equivocal in part due to methodological difficulties and also because the same factors that predispose a woman to multiple unwanted pregnancies may also predispose her to mental health problems.

National Cancer Institute. 2003–. Summary report: Early reproductive events and breast cancer workshop . Atlanta: National Institutes of Health.

This report emerged from an extensive workshop on early reproductive events and cancer and was updated with more recent evidence in 2010. The review of the available evidence does not support any hypothesis that early termination of pregnancy causes breast cancer.

Raymond, Elizabeth G., and David A. Grimes. 2012. The comparative safety of legal induced abortion and childbirth in the United States. Obstetrics & Gynecology 119.2, Part 1: 215–219.

DOI: 10.1097/AOG.0b013e31823fe923 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

Using national surveillance, survey, and birth certificate data for 1998–2005, the authors find that the risk of death associated with childbirth (8.8 deaths per 100,000 live births) is approximately fourteen times higher than that with abortion (0.6 deaths per 100,000). Similarly, the overall morbidity associated with childbirth exceeds that with abortion. Available online for purchase or by subscription.

Zane, Suzanne, Andreea A. Creanga, Cynthia J. Berg, et al. 2015. Abortion-related mortality in the United States, 1998–2010. Obstetrics & Gynecology 126.2: 258–265.

DOI: 10.1097/AOG.0000000000000945 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This article examines characteristics and causes of legal induced abortion-related deaths. Abortion mortality rates are computed by maternal age, gestational age, and race and the distribution of causes of death by gestational age and procedure.

Postabortion care (PAC) is needed to provide both emergency treatment for complications caused by incomplete or spontaneous abortion and family planning counseling and services to prevent future unplanned pregnancies that may result in repeat abortions. The Postabortion Care Consortium was formed in 1993 by family planning and reproductive health agencies, nongovernmental organizations, and donor agencies. Its expanded and updated Essential Elements of PAC model includes emergency treatment of postabortion complications, strengthening contraceptive provision and family planning services, providing referrals to other accessible facilities for other reproductive health services, building partnerships with communities and service providers, and counseling for women’s emotional and physical health needs and other concerns. Billings and Benson 2005 and Senlet, et al. 2001 describe the experience of several Latin American countries and Turkey, respectively, in institutionalizing the provision of the main elements of PAC. The revised PAC model was extended in practice by the CATALYST Consortium of reproductive health and family planning agencies initiated by the US Agency for International Development (USAID; CATALYST Consortium 2005 ). Curtis 2007 describes more recent strategies by USAID in tandem with multiple organizations to provide this critical health-care service, and multiple downloadable resources are available from USAID’s Information and Knowledge for Optimal Health (INFO) Project and the Postabortion Care Consortium . Huber, et al. 2016 reviews findings from PAC studies published in the peer-reviewed and gray literature and proceeds to highlight programmatic implications. Overall, PAC services have expanded in a number of countries and their quality has generally improved, but a recent assessment— RamaRao, et al. 2011 —points out that in many countries where abortion is legally restricted or otherwise sensitive, PAC services are often deficient, and postabortion contraceptive counseling is still poorly integrated with family planning and other reproductive health care.

Billings, Deborah L., and Janie Benson. 2005. Postabortion care in Latin America: Policy and service recommendations from a decade of operations research . Health Policy and Planning 20.3: 158–166.

DOI: 10.1093/heapol/czi020 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This article reviews results from ten major PAC operations research projects conducted in public sector hospitals in seven Latin American countries. These operations achieved positive outcomes and indicated that more comprehensive PAC can and should be made available.

CATALYST Consortium. 2005. PAC compilation document . Washington, DC: US Agency for International Development.

This report documents PAC programs implemented in Bolivia, Egypt, and Peru as well as lessons learned.

Curtis, Carolyn. 2007. Meeting health care needs of women experiencing complications of miscarriage and unsafe abortion: USAID’s postabortion care program. Journal of Midwifery & Women’s Health 52.4: 368–375.

DOI: 10.1016/j.jmwh.2007.03.005 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This article describes the five-year strategy initiated in 2003 by USAID to provide financial and technical assistance for PAC services in seven countries. Available online for purchase or by subscription.

Huber, Douglas, Carolyn Curtis, Laili Irani, Sara Pappa, and Lauren Arrington. 2016. Postabortion care: 20 years of strong evidence on emergency treatment, family planning, and other programming components. Global Health: Science and Practice 4.3: 481–494.

A review of findings from studies published between 1994 and 2013 that offer strong evidence on postabortion care (PAC) and its components, particularly in low- and middle-income countries. In addition, the article considers some of the important programmatic implications.

Postabortion Care Consortium .

This website describes the essential elements of a widely adopted model of PAC care. It also makes available information and resources about PAC care, with examples from different parts of the world.

RamaRao, Saumya, John W. Townsend, Nafissatou Diop, and Sarah Raifman. 2011. Postabortion care: Going to scale . International Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health 37.1: 40–44.

DOI: 10.1363/3704011 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This article reviews what is required to scale up PAC programs in many countries and obstacles that must be overcome to make such services more accessible.

Senlet, Pinar, Levent Cagatay, Julide Ergin, and Jill Mathis. 2001. Bridging the gap: Integrating family planning with abortion services in Turkey . International Family Planning Perspectives 27.2: 90–95.

DOI: 10.2307/2673821 Save Citation » Export Citation » Share Citation »

This article reviews Turkey’s experience of implementing and scaling up postabortion family planning services, which were delivered through three related phases. This process reduced abortion through increasing contraceptive use, tilting the method mix toward more effective methods, and securing the commitment of decision makers.

US Agency for International Development. Information and Knowledge for Optimal Health (INFO) Project .

The INFO project website provides multiple resources that can be freely downloaded on PAC. These include a guide to research evidence on PAC, recommended policies, service delivery guidelines, assessment tools, and other documents and tools.

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Introduction: The Politics of Abortion 50 Years after Roe

Katrina Kimport is a professor with the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Reproductive Sciences and a medical sociologist with the ANSIRH program at the University of California, San Francisco. Her research examines the (re)production of inequality in health and reproduction, with a topical focus on abortion, contraception, and pregnancy. She is the author of No Real Choice: How Culture and Politics Matter for Reproductive Autonomy (2022) and Queering Marriage: Challenging Family Formation in the United States (2014) and co-author, with Jennifer Earl, of Digitally Enabled Social Change (2011). She has published more than 75 articles in sociology, health research, and interdisciplinary journals.

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Rebecca Kreitzer is an associate professor of public policy at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her research focuses on gendered political representation and intersectional policy inequality in the US states. Much of her research focuses on the political dynamics of reproductive health care, especially surrounding contraception and abortion. She has published dozens of articles in political science, public policy, and law journals.

[email protected]

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Katrina Kimport , Rebecca Kreitzer; Introduction: The Politics of Abortion 50 Years after Roe . J Health Polit Policy Law 1 August 2023; 48 (4): 463–484. doi: https://doi.org/10.1215/03616878-10451382

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Abortion is central to the American political landscape and a common pregnancy outcome, yet research on abortion has been siloed and marginalized in the social sciences. In an empirical analysis, the authors found only 22 articles published in this century in the top economics, political science, and sociology journals. This special issue aims to bring abortion research into a more generalist space, challenging what the authors term “the abortion research paradox,” wherein abortion research is largely absent from prominent disciplinary social science journals but flourishes in interdisciplinary and specialized journals. After discussing the misconceptions that likely contribute to abortion research siloization and the implications of this siloization for abortion research as well as social science knowledge more generally, the authors introduce the articles in this special issue. Then, in a call for continued and expanded research on abortion, the introduction to this special issue closes by offering three guiding practices for abortion scholars—both those new to the topic and those deeply familiar with it—in the hopes of building an ever-richer body of literature on abortion politics, policy, and law. The need for such a robust literature is especially acute following the US Supreme Court's June 2022 overturning of the constitutional right to abortion.

Abortion has been both siloed and marginalized in social science research. But because abortion is a perennially politically and socially contested issue as well as vital health care that one in four women in the United States will experience in their lifetime (Jones and Jerman 2022 ), it is imperative that social scientists make a change. This special issue brings together insightful voices from across disciplines to do just that—and does so at a particularly important historical moment. Fifty years after the United States Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade (1973) decision set a national standard amid disparate state policies on abortion, we again find ourselves in a country with a patchwork of laws about abortion. In Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization (2022), the Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to abortion it had established in Roe , purportedly returning the question of legalization of abortion to the states. In the immediate aftermath of the Dobbs decision, state policies polarized, and public opinion shifted. This moment demands scholarly evaluation of where we have been, how we arrived at this moment, and what we should be attentive to in coming years. This special issue came about, in part, in response to the on-the-ground conditions of abortion in the United States.

As we argue below, the siloization of abortion research means that the social science literature broadly is not (yet) equipped to make sense of this moment, our history, and what the future holds. First, though, we make a case for the importance of political scientists, economists, and sociologists studying abortion. Then we describe the siloization of abortion research through what we call the “abortion research paradox,” wherein abortion research—despite its social and political import—is curiously absent from top disciplinary journals, even as it thrives in other publication venues that are often interdisciplinary and usually specialized. We theorize some reasons for this siloization and discuss the consequences, both for generalist knowledge and for scientific understanding of abortion. We then introduce the articles in this special issue, noting the breadth of methodological, topical, and theoretical approaches to abortion research they demonstrate. Finally, we offer three suggestions for scholars—both those new to abortion research and those already deeply familiar with it—embarking on abortion research in the hopes of building an ever-richer body of literature on abortion politics, policy, and law.

• Why Abortion?

Abortion has arguably shaped the American political landscape more than any other domestic policy issue in the last 50 years. Since the Supreme Court initially established a nationwide right to abortion in Roe v. Wade (1973), debate over this right has influenced elections at just about every level of office (Abramowitz 1995 ; Cook, Hartwig, and Wilcox 1993 ; Cook, Jelen, and Wilcox 1994 ; Cook, Jelen, and Wilcox 1992 ; Paolino 1995 ; Roh and Haider-Markel 2003 ), inspired political activism (Carmines and Woods 2002 ; Killian and Wilcox 2008 ; Maxwell 2002 ; Verba, Schlozman, and Brady 1995 ) and social movements (Kretschmer 2014 ; Meyer and Staggenborg 1996 , 2008 ; Munson 2010a , Munson 2010b ; Rohlinger 2006 ; Staggenborg 1991 ), and fundamentally structured partisan politics (Adams 1997; Carsey and Layman 2006 ; Killian and Wilcox 2008 ). Position on abortion is frequently used as the litmus test for those seeking political office (Flaten 2010 ; Kreitzer and Osborn 2019 ). Opponents to legal abortion have transformed the federal judiciary (Hollis-Brusky and Parry 2021 ; Hollis-Brusky and Wilson 2020 ). Indeed, abortion is often called the quintessential “morality policy” issue (Kreitzer 2015 ; Kreitzer, Kane, and Mooney 2019 ; Mooney 2001 ; Mucciaroni, Ferraiolo, and Rubado 2019 ) and “ground zero” in the prominent culture wars that have polarized Americans (Adams 1997 ; Lewis 2017 ; Mouw and Sobel 2001 ; Wilson 2013 ). Almost fifty years after Roe v. Wade , in June 2022, the US Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to abortion in its Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization decision, ushering in a new chapter of political engagement on abortion.

But abortion is not simply an abstract political issue; it is an extremely common pregnancy outcome. Indeed, as noted above, about one in four US women will get an abortion in her lifetime (Jones and Jerman 2022 ), although the rates of unintended pregnancy and abortion vary substantially across racial and socioeconomic groups (Dehlendorf, Harris, and Weitz 2013 ; Jones and Jerman 2022 ). Despite rampant misinformation claiming otherwise, abortion is a safe procedure (Raymond and Grimes 2012 ; Upadhyay et al. 2015 ), reduces physical health consequences and mortality (Gerdts et al. 2016 ), and does not cause mental health issues (Charles et al. 2008 ; Major et al. 2009 ) or regret (Rocca et al. 2013 , 2015 , 2020 ). Abortion also has a significant impact on people's lives beyond health outcomes. Legal abortion is associated with educational attainment (Everett et al. 2019 ; Ralph et al. 2019 ; Mølland 2016 ) as well as higher female labor force participation, and it affects men's and women's long-term earning potential (Bernstein and Jones 2019 ; Bloom et al. 2009 ; Everett et al. 2019 ; Kalist 2004 ). Access to abortion also shapes relationship satisfaction and stability (Biggs et al. 2014 ; Mauldon, Foster, and Roberts 2015 ). The preponderance of evidence, in other words, demonstrates substantial benefits and no harms to allowing pregnant people to choose abortion.

Yet access to abortion in the United States has been rapidly declining for years. Most abortion care in the United States takes place in stand-alone outpatient facilities that primarily provide reproductive health care (Jones, Witwer, and Jerman 2019 ). As antiabortion legislators in some states have advanced policies that target these facilities, the number of abortion clinics has decreased (Gerdts et al. 2022 ; Venator and Fletcher 2021 ), leaving large geographical areas lacking an abortion facility (Cartwright et al. 2018 ; Cohen and Joffe 2020 ) and thus diminishing pregnant people's ability to obtain abortion care when and where they need it.

The effects of policies regulating abortion, including those that target facilities, have been unevenly experienced, with people of color (Jones and Jerman 2022 ), people in rural areas (Bearak, Burke, and Jones 2017 ), and those who are financially struggling (Cook et al. 1999 ; Roberts et al. 2019 ) disproportionately affected. Even before the Dobbs decision overturned the constitutional right to abortion, the American landscape was characterized by ever-broadening contraception deserts (Axelson, Sealy, and McDonald-Mosley 2022 ; Barber et al. 2019 ; Kreitzer et al. 2021 ; Smith et al. 2022 ), maternity care deserts (Simpson 2020 ; Taporco et al. 2021 ; Wallace et al. 2021 ), and abortion deserts (Cartwright et al. 2018 ; Cohen and Joffe 2020 ; Engle and Freeman 2022 ; McNamara et al. 2022 ; Pleasants, Cartwright, and Upadhyay 2022 ). After Dobbs , access to abortion around the country changed in a matter of weeks. In the 100 days after Roe was overturned, at least 66 clinics closed in 15 states, with 14 of those states no longer having any abortion facilities (Kirstein et al. 2022 ). In this moment of heightened contention about an issue with a long history of social and political contestation, social scientists have a rich opportunity to contribute to scientific knowledge as well as policy and practice that affect millions of lives. This special issue steps into that opportunity.

• The Abortion Research Paradox

This special issue is also motivated by what we call the abortion research paradox. As established above, abortion fundamentally shapes politics in a myriad of ways and is a very common pregnancy outcome, with research consistently demonstrating that access to abortion is consequential and beneficial to people's lives. However, social science research on abortion is rarely published in top disciplinary journals. Abortion is a topic of clear social science interest and is well suited for social science inquiry, but it is relatively underrepresented as a topic in generalist social science journals. To measure this underrepresentation empirically, we searched for original research articles about abortion in the United Sates in the top journals of political science, sociology, and economics. We identified the top three journals for each discipline by considering journal reputation within their respective discipline as well as impact factors and Google Scholar rankings. (There is room for debate about what makes a journal a “top” general interest journal, but that is beyond our scope. Whether these journals are exactly the top three is debatable; nonetheless, these are undoubtedly among the top general-interest or “flagship” disciplinary journals and thus representative of what the respective disciplines value as top scholarship.) Then we searched specified journal databases for the keyword “abortion” for articles published in this century (i.e., 2000–2021), excluding commentaries and book reviews. We found few articles about abortion: just seven in economics journals, eight in political science journals, and seven in sociology journals. We read the articles and classified each into one of three categories: articles primarily about abortion; articles about more than one aspect of reproductive health, inclusive of abortion; or articles about several policy issues, among which abortion is one ( table 1 ).

In the three top economics journals, articles about abortion focused on the relationships between abortion and crime or educational attainment, or on the impact of abortion policies on trends in the timing of first births of women (Bitler and Zavodny 2002 ; Donohue III and Levitt 2001 ; Myers 2017 ). Articles that studied abortion as one among several topics also studied “morally controversial” issues (Elías et al. 2017 ), the electoral implications of abortion (Glaeser, Ponzetto, and Shapiro 2005 ; Washington 2008 ), or contraception (Bailey 2010 ). Articles published in the three top political science journals that focused primarily on abortion evaluated judicial decision-making and legitimacy (Caldarone, Canes-Wrone, and Clark 2009 ; Zink, Spriggs, and Scott 2009 ) or public opinion (Kalla, Levine, and Broockman 2022 ; Rosenfeld, Imai, and Shapiro 2016 ). More commonly, abortion was one of several (or many) different issues analyzed, including government spending and provision of services, government help for African Americans, law enforcement, health care, education, free speech, Hatch Act restrictions, and the Clinton impeachment. The degree to which these articles are “about abortion” varies considerably. In the three top sociology journals, articles represented a slightly broader range of topics, including policy diffusion (Boyle, Kim, and Longhofer 2015 ), public opinion (Mouw and Sobel 2001 ), social movements (Ferree 2003 ), and crisis pregnancy centers (McVeigh, Crubaugh, and Estep 2017 ). Unlike in economics and political science, articles in sociology on abortion mostly focused directly on abortion.

The Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law ( JHPPL ) would seem well positioned to publish research on abortion. Yet, even in JHPPL , abortion research is not very common. In the same time period (2000–2021), JHPPL published five articles on reproductive health: two articles on abortion (Daniels et al. 2016 ; Kimport, Johns, and Upadhyay 2018 ), one on contraception (Kreitzer et al. 2021 ), one on forced interventions on pregnant people (Paltrow and Flavin 2013 ), and one about how states could respond to the passage of the Affordable Care Act mandate regarding reproductive health (Stulberg 2013 ).

This is not to say that there is no extensive, rigorous published research on abortion in the social science literature. Interdisciplinary journals that are focused on reproductive health, such as Contraception and Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health , as well as health research journals, such as the American Journal of Public Health and Social Science & Medicine , regularly published high-quality social science research on abortion during the focal time period. Research on abortion can also be found in disciplinary subfield journals. In the same time period addressed above, the Journal of Women, Politics, and Public Policy and Politics & Gender— two subfield journals focused on gender and politics—each published around 20 articles that mentioned abortion in the abstract. In practice, while this means excellent research on abortion is published, the net effect is that abortion research is siloed from other research areas in the disciplines of economics, political science, and sociology. This special issue aims to redress some of this siloization and to inspire future scholarship on abortion. Our motivation is not simply premised on quantitative counts, however. As we assert below, abortion research siloization has significant consequences for knowledge—and especially for real people's lives. First, though, we consider some of the possible reasons for this siloization.

• The Origins of Siloization

We do not know why abortion research is not more commonly published in top disciplinary journals, given the topic's clear importance in key areas of focus for these disciplines, including public discourse, politics, law, family life, and health. The siloing and marginalization of abortion is likely related to several misconceptions. For one, because of social contention on the issue, peer reviewers may not have a deep understanding of abortion as a research topic, may express hostility to the topic, or may believe that abortion is exceptional in some way—a niche or ungeneralizable research topic better published in a subfield journal. Scholars themselves may share this mischaracterization of abortion. As Borgman ( 2014 ) argues about the legal arena, and as Roberts, Schroeder, and Joffe ( 2020 ) provide evidence of in medicine, abortion is regularly treated as exceptional, making it both definitional and reasonable that abortion be treated differently in the law and in health care from other medical experiences. Scholars are not immune to social patterns that exceptionalize abortion. In their peer and editor reviews, they may inappropriately—and perhaps inadvertently—draw on their social, rather than academic, knowledge. For scholars of abortion, reviews premised on social knowledge may not be constructive to strengthening the research, and additional labor may be required to educate reviewers and editors on the academic parameters of the topic, including which social assumptions about abortion are scientifically inaccurate. Comments from authors educating editors and peer reviewers on abortion research may then counterintuitively reinforce the (mis)perception that abortion research is niche and not of general interest.

Second, authors' negative experiences while trying to publish about abortion or reproductive health in top disciplinary journals may compound as scholars share information about journals. This is the case for research on gender; evidence from political science suggests that certain journals are perceived as more or less likely to publish research on gender (Brown et al. 2020 ). Such reputations, especially for venues that do not publish abortion research, may not even be rooted in negative experiences. The absence of published articles on abortion may itself dissuade scholars from submitting to a journal based on an educated guess that the journal does not welcome abortion research. Regardless of the veracity of these perceptions, certain journals may get a reputation for publishing on abortion (or not), which then may make future submissions of abortion research to those outlets more (or less) likely. After all, authors seek publication venues where they believe their research will get a robust review and is likely to be published. This pattern may be more common for some author groups than others. Research from political science suggests women are more risk averse than men when it comes to publishing strategies and less likely to submit manuscripts to journals where the perceived likelihood of successful publication is lower (Key and Sumner 2019 ). Special issues like this one are an important way for journals without a substantial track record of publishing abortion research to establish their willingness to do so.

Third, there might be a methodological bias, which unevenly intersects with some author groups. Top disciplinary journals are more likely to publish quantitative approaches rather than qualitative ones, which can result in the exclusion of women and minority scholars who are more likely to utilize mixed or qualitative methods (Teele and Thelen 2017 ). To the extent that investigations of abortion in the social sciences have utilized qualitative rather than quantitative methods, that might contribute to the underrepresentation of abortion-focused scholarship in top disciplinary journals.

Stepping back from the idiosyncrasies of peer review and methodologies, a fourth explanation for why abortion research is not more prominent in generalist social science journals may arise far earlier than the publishing process. PhD-granting departments in the social sciences may have an undersupply of scholars with expertise in reproductive health who can mentor junior scholars interested in studying abortion. (We firmly believe one need not be an expert in reproductive health to mentor junior scholars studying reproductive health, so this explanation only goes so far.) Anecdotally, we have experienced and heard many accounts of scholars who were discouraged from focusing on abortion in dissertation research because of advisors', mentors', and senior scholars' misconceptions about the topic and about the viability of a career in abortion research. In data provided to us by Key and Sumner from their analysis of the “leaky pipeline” in the publication of research on gender at top disciplinary journals in political science (Key and Sumner 2019 ), there were only nine dissertations written between 2000 and 2013 that mention abortion in the abstract, most of which are focused on judicial behavior or political party dynamics rather than focusing on abortion policy itself. If few junior scholars focus on abortion, it makes sense there may be an undersupply of cutting-edge social science research on abortion submitted to top disciplinary journals.

• The Implications of Siloization

The relative lack of scholarly attention to abortion as a social phenomenon in generalist journals has implications for general scholarship. Most concerningly, it limits our ability to understand other social phenomena for which the case of abortion is a useful entry point. For example, the case of abortion as a common, highly safe medical procedure is useful for examining medical innovations and technologies, such as telemedicine. Similarly, given the disparities in who seeks and obtains abortion care in the United States, abortion is an excellent case study for scholars interested in race, class, and gender inequality. It also holds great potential as an opportunity for exploration of public opinion and attitudes, particularly as a case of an issue whose ties to partisan politics have solidified over time and that is often—but not always—“moralized” in policy engagement (Kreitzer, Kane, and Mooney 2019 ). Additionally, there are missed opportunities to generate theory from the specifics of abortion. For example, there is ample evidence of abortion stigma and stigmatization (Hanschmidt et al. 2016 ) and of their effects on people who obtain abortions (Sorhaindo and Lavelanet 2022 ). This research is often unmoored from existing theorization on stigmatization, however, because the bulk of the stigma literature focuses on identities; and having had an abortion is not an identity the same way as, for example, being queer is. (For a notable exception to this trend, see Beynon-Jones 2017 .)

There is, it must be noted, at least one benefit of abortion research being regularly siloed within social science disciplines. The small but growing number of researchers engaged in abortion research has often had to seek mentorship and collaborations outside their disciplines. Indeed, several of the articles included in this special issue come from multidisciplinary author teams, building bridges between disciplinary literatures and pushing knowledge forward. Social scientists studying abortion regularly engage with research by clinicians and clinician-researchers, which is somewhat rare in the academy. The interdisciplinary journals noted above that regularly publish social science abortion research ( Contraception and Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health ) also regularly publish clinical articles and are read by advocates and policy makers. In other words, social scientists studying abortion frequently reach audiences that include clinicians, advocates, and policy makers, marking an opportunity for social science research to influence practice.

The siloization of abortion research in the social sciences affects more than broad social science knowledge; it also dramatically shapes our understanding of abortion. When abortion researchers are largely relegated to their own spaces, they risk missing opportunities to learn from other areas of scholarship that are not related to abortion. Lacking context from other topics, abortion scholars may inaccurately understand an aspect of abortion as exceptional that is not, or they may reinvent the proverbial theoretical wheel to describe an abortion-related phenomenon that is not actually unique to abortion. For example, scholars have studied criminalized behavior for decades, offering theoretical insights and methodological best practices for research on illegal activities. With abortion now illegal in many states, abortion researchers can benefit from drawing on that extant literature to examine the implications of illegality, identifying which aspects of abortion illegality are unique and which are common to other illegal activities. Likewise, methodologically, abortion researchers can learn from other researchers of illegal activities about how to protect participants' confidentiality.

The ontological and epistemological implications for the siloization of abortion research extend beyond reproductive health. When abortion research is not part of the central discussions in economics, political science, and sociology, our understanding of health policy, politics, and law is impoverished. We thus miss opportunities to identify and address chronic health disparities and health inequities, with both conceptual and practical consequences. These oversights matter for people's lives. Following the June 2022 Dobbs decision, millions of people with the capacity of pregnancy are now barred from one key way to control fertility: abortion. The implications of scholars' failure to comprehensively grapple with the place of abortion in health policy, politics, and law are playing out in those people's lives and the lives of their loved ones.

Articles in this Special Issue

In this landscape, we offer this special issue on “The Politics of Abortion 50 Years After Roe .” We seek in this issue to illustrate some of the many ways abortion can and should be studied, with benefits not only for scholarly knowledge about abortion and its role in policy, politics, and law but also for general knowledge about health policy, politics, and law themselves.

The issue's articles represent multiple disciplines, including several articles by multidisciplinary teams. Although public health has long been a welcoming home for abortion research, authors in this special issue point to opportunities in anthropology, sociology, and political science, among other disciplines, for the study of abortion. We do not see the differences and variations among disciplinary approaches as a competition. Rather, we believe that the more diverse the body of researchers grappling with questions about abortion, abortion provision, and abortion patients, the better our collective knowledge about abortion and its role in the social landscape.

The same goes for diversity of methodological approaches. Authors in this issue employ qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods, showcasing compelling methodological variation. There is no singular or best methodology for answering research questions about abortion. Instead, the impressive variation in methodological approaches in this special issue highlights the vast methodological opportunities for future research. A diversity of methodologies enables a diversity of research questions. Indeed, different methods can identify, generate, and respond to different research questions, enriching the literature on abortion. The methodologies represented in this issue are certainly not exhaustive, but we believe they are suggestive of future opportunities for scholarly exploration and investigation. We hope these articles will provide a road map for rich expansions of the research literature on abortion.

By way of brief introduction, we offer short summaries of the included articles. Baker traces the history of medication abortion in the United States, cataloging the initial approval of the two-part regimen by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), subsequent policy debates over FDA-imposed restrictions on how medication abortion is dispensed, and the work of abortion access advocates to get medication abortion to people who need it. Weaving together accounts of health care policy, abortion advocacy, and on-the-ground activism, Baker illustrates both the unique contentions specific to abortion policy and how the history of medication abortion can be seen as a case of health care advocacy.

Two of the issue's articles focus on state-level legislative policy on abortion. Roth and Lee generate an original data set cataloging the introduction and implementation of statutes on abortion and other aspects of reproductive health at the state level in the United States monthly, from 1994 to 2022. In their descriptive analysis, the authors highlight trends in abortion legislation and the emergent pattern of state polarization around abortion. Their examination adds rich longitudinal context to contemporary analyses of reproductive health legislation, providing a valuable resource for future scholarship. Carson and Carter similarly attend to state-level legislation, zeroing in on the case of abortion policy in response to the COVID-19 pandemic to show how legislation unrelated to abortion has been opportunistically used to restrict abortion access. The authors also examine how abortion is discursively constructed as a risk to public health. This latter move, they argue, builds on previous constructions of abortion as a risk to individual health and points to a new horizon of antiabortion constructions of the meaning of abortion access.

Kim et al. and Kumar examine the implementation of US abortion policies. Kim et al. use an original data set of 20 years of state supreme court decisions to investigate factors that affect state supreme court decision-making on abortion. Their regression analysis uncovers the complex relationship between state legislatures, state supreme courts, and the voting public for the case of abortion. Kumar charts how 50 years of US abortion policy have affected global access to abortion, offering insights into the underexamined international implications of US abortion policy and into social movement advocacy that has expanded abortion access around the world.

Karlin and Joffe and Heymann et al. draw on data collected when Roe was still the law of the land to investigate phenomena that are likely to become far more common now that Roe has been overturned. Karlin and Joffe utilize interviews with 40 physicians who provide abortions to examine their perspectives on people who terminate their pregnancies outside the formal health care system—an abortion pathway whose popularity increases when abortion access constricts (Aiken et al. 2022 ). By contextualizing their findings on the contradictions physicians voiced—desiring to support reproductive autonomy but invested in physician authority—in a historical overview of how mainstream medicine has marginalized abortion provision since the early days after Roe , the authors add nuance to understandings of the “formal health care system,” its members, and the stakes faced by people bypassing this system to obtain their desired health outcome. Heymann et al. investigate a process also likely to increase in the wake of the Dobbs decision: the implementation of restrictive state-level abortion policy by unelected bureaucrats. Using the case of variances for a written transfer agreement requirement in Ohio—a requirement with no medical merit that is designed to add administrative burden to stand-alone abortion clinics—Heymann et al. demonstrate how bureaucratic discretion by political appointees can increase the administrative burden of restrictive abortion laws and thus further constrain abortion access. Together, these two articles demonstrate how pre- Roe data can point scholars to areas that merit investigation after Roe has been overturned.

Finally, using mixed methods, Buyuker et al. analyze attitudes about abortion acceptability and the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision, distinguishing what people think about abortion from what they know about abortion policy. In addition to providing methodological insights about survey items related to abortion attitudes, the authors expose a disconnect between how people think about abortion acceptability and their support for the Roe decision. In other words, as polarized as abortion attitudes are said to be, there is unacknowledged and largely unmeasured complexity in how the general public thinks about abortion.

Future Research on Abortion

We hope that a desire to engage in abortion research prompts scholars to read the excellent articles in this special issue. We also hope that reading these pieces inspires at least some readers to engage in abortion research. Having researched abortion for nearly three decades between us, we are delighted by the emerging interest in studying abortion, whether as a focal topic or alongside a different focus. This research is essential to our collective understanding of abortion politics, policy, and law and the many millions of people whose lives are affected by US abortion politics, policy, and law annually. In light of the limitations of the current field of abortion research, we have several suggestions for scholars of abortion, regardless of their level of familiarity with the topic.

First, know and cite the existing literature on abortion. To address the siloization of abortion research, and particularly the scarcity of abortion research published in generalist journals, scholars must be sure to build on the impressive work that has been published on the topic in specialized spaces. Moreover, becoming familiar with existing research can help scholars avoid several common pitfalls in abortion research. For example, being immersed in existing literature can help scholars avoid outdated, imprecise, or inappropriate language and terminology. Smith et al. ( 2018 ), for instance, illuminate the implications of clinicians deploying seemingly everday language around “elective” abortion. They find that it muddies the distinction between the use of “elective” colloquially and in clinical settings, contributing to the stigmatization of abortion and abortion patients. Examinations like theirs advance understanding of abortion stigmatization while highlighting for scholars the importance of being sensitive to and reflective about language. Familiarity with existing research can help scholars avoid methodological pitfalls as well, such as incomplete understanding of the organization of abortion provision. Although Planned Parenthood has brand recognition for providing abortion care, the majority of abortions in the United States are performed at independent abortion clinics. Misunderstanding the provision landscape can have consequences for some study designs.

Second, we encourage scholars of abortion to think critically about the ideological underpinnings of how their research questions and findings are framed. Academic research of all kinds, including abortion, is better when it is critical of ideologically informed premises. Abortion scholars must be careful to avoid uncritically accepting both antiabortion premises and abortion-supportive premises, especially as those premises unconsciously guide much of the public discourse on abortion. Scholars have the opportunity to use methodological tools not to find an objective truth per se but to challenge the uncontested common sense claims that frequently guide public thinking on abortion. One strategy for avoiding common framing pitfalls is to construct research and analysis to center the people most affected by abortion politics, policy, and law (Kimport and McLemore 2022 ). Another strategy is to critique what Baird and Millar ( 2019 , 2020 ) have termed the performative nature of abortion scholarship. Abortion scholarship, they note, has predominantly focused on negative aspects and effects of abortion care. Research that finds and explores affirmatively positive aspects—for instance, the joy in abortion—can crucially thicken scholarly understanding.

Third, related to our discussion above, scholars of abortion face an interesting challenge regarding how abortion is and is not exceptional. Research on abortion must attend to how abortion has been exceptionalized—and marginalized—in policy and practices. But there are also numerous instances where abortion is only one example of many. In these cases, investigation of abortion under the assumption that it is exceptional is an unnecessary limitation on the work's contribution. Scholars of abortion benefit from mastery of the literature on abortion, yet knowing this literature is not sufficient. There are important bridges from scholarship on abortion to scholarship in other areas, important conversations across and within literatures, that can yield insights both about abortion and about other topical foci.

As guest coeditors of this special issue, we are delighted by the rich and growing body of scholarship on abortion, to which the articles in this special issue represent an important addition. There is still much more work to be done. Going forward, we are eager to see future scholarship on abortion build on this work and tackle new questions.

• Acknowledgments

The authors thank Krystale Littlejohn, Jon Oberlander, Ellen Key, and Jane Sumner for their helpful feedback on earlier drafts of this article. Both authors contributed equally to this article and are listed alphabetically.

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Data & Figures

Number of Articles about Abortion in Top Disciplinary Journals, 2000–2021

Note : AER  =  American Economic Review ; QJE  =  Quarterly Journal of Economics ; JPE  =  Journal of Political Economy ; APSR  =  American Political Science Review ; AJPS  =  American Journal of Political Science ; JOP  =  Journal of Politics ; ASR  =  American Sociological Review ; AJS  =  American Journal of Sociology ; ARS  =  Annual Review of Sociology.

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