From Feminist Anarchy to Decolonisation: Understanding Abortion Health Activism Before and After the Repeal of the 8<sup>th</sup> Amendment

On the issue of abortion, Ireland and Poland have been among the most conservative countries in Europe. Their legal and cultural approaches to this issue have been deeply influenced by the institution of the Catholic Church and its purported role as a defender of an authentic national identity. However, their political climates for abortion reform are increasingly divergent: Ireland has liberalised its abortion law substantially since 2018, while Poland is moving towards further criminalisation with the repeated introduction of restrictive laws in parliament. Both have seen active pro-choice movements who mobilise for reform and widespread non-compliance with their restrictive abortion laws, but the policy impact of these trends varies significantly. What accounts for this difference? This article draws on comparative analysis of Ireland and Poland to assess their divergent trajectories on abortion reform, arguing that the most significant driver of change between the two is the disparity in influence of the Catholic Church on politics and policymaking.

Section: Irelandmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Feminist Activism In the Context Of Morality Policy And Church–state Relationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Persistence and Change in Morality Policy: The Role of the Catholic Church in the Politics of Abortion in Ireland and Poland

Calkin¹,

Kamińska²

2020

“…The campaign too largely ignored the difficulties of access to abortion for people of colour, migrants with precarious legal status in Ireland, trans people, young people, people in abusive and controlling relationships (MERJ, 2019). These are the same people who continue to feel the sharpest edges of the restrictions of Irish law, too often left behind by the new legislation, still relying on travel, self-managed abortion and the mutual aid of feminist activism to escape from undesired pregnancy (MERJ, 2019; de Londras, 2020, this issue; Duffy, 2020, this issue; Side, 2020, this issue). Migrant and trans reproductive rights activists in particular continue to make (righteous) demands for atonement from the official campaign, and much work remains to be done (de Londras, forthcoming).…”

Section: The Referendum and The New Lawmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Transnational abortion health activism has been a continuous solidarity practice between women in Ireland and abroad—especially in England, where groups like the Liverpool Ireland Abortion Support Service (1979–1985), Escort (1988–2003) and the Abortion Support Network (2009–present) have been and are still active. Deidre Duffy (2020, this issue) traces the past and present of these organisations through the lenses of feminist anarchy and decolonisation to understand their systems of support for abortion seekers as political acts of resistance to oppressive governing structures. The forms of solidarity work that abortion health activists engage in often involve caring practices like advice, support, hosting and other activities that have been traditionally depoliticised by their association with domestic, feminised spaces.…”

Section: Transnational Activismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Abortion in Ireland: Introduction to the Themed Issue

Calkin¹,

Londras²,

Heathcote³

2020

Trinity College Dublin to discuss spatiality and abortion law reform in Ireland. The 8 th Amendment ('the 8 th ') was still part of the Irish Constitution. Some contributors were cautious, wary of predicting success in the forthcoming referendum, nervous of the fight to come. Others were more confident; change would come, the 8 th would be removed from the Constitution, a new and better law would replace it although, of course, law alone would never be enough. Over the course of the day, scholars, activists, artists, politicians and policymakers discussed what was possible, likely, desirable. Ours was one of thousands of gatherings that had taken place over three-and-a-half decades of activism for abortion law reform in Ireland, but also one of the earliest since the government had confirmed that there would be a referendum on repeal of the 8 th Amendment. The referendum was scheduled for 25 May 2018, almost exactly three months after our workshop. By the time those of us based outside of Ireland were scheduled to fly back to our homes the next day, the snow had become so heavy that many flights had been cancelled. Our time in Dublin extended as the weather worsened. Those unexpected Dublin days contained moments of togetherness, happiness, frustration and exhaustion; on occasion our stuckness brought us together over pints and on snowy walks through almost-deserted city streets. We thought and spoke frequently of the dozens of women who must have had to abandon flights that had been booked to take them for their desired abortions over those days. Some of them probably ended up having to continue with their pregnancies, mere months too early for the referendum and almost a year too early for the new law that would finally make abortion lawful for many women in many circumstances in the Republic of Ireland. Much has, of course, changed since our gathering in Dublin. The 8 th Amendment has been repealed. The new law, the Health (Regulation of Termination of Pregnancy) Act 2018 (2018), has been introduced. As of 22 October 2019, abortion has been decriminalised for our siblings in Northern Ireland and legislation is expected there in the spring of 2020. However, as we predicted on that snowy day in Dublin, reproductive life under the new constitutional and legislative regime remains difficult, uneven and sometimes cruel. In the articles, Open Space pieces and creative 897684F ER0010.

“…They constituted a kind of ‘network of escape’, making movement possible, reducing risks and holding onto a ‘vital wager’, as Verónica Gago (2018, p. 339) puts it, when considering the significance of migration routes from Bolivia to Argentina. Open Line Counselling and the Women’s Information Network provided underground assistance in Ireland, and IWASG, ESCORT and LASS provided assistance in Britain (Fletcher, 2017; Duffy, 2020, this issue). While Liverpool-based LASS and ESCORT did not bear particular traces of diaspora organising, IWASG shared a diasporic consciousness with its Spanish equivalent at the time (Rossiter, 2009; see also IWASG, 1988).…”

Section: Messy Genealogies: Citing Imelda’s Sourcesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cheeky Witnessing

Fletcher¹

2020

Feminists witness legal worlds as they observe, document and share nothing less than the reproduction of life itself. The world of the abortion trail, where people and things move across borders to change life’s reproduction, has generated a rich variety of legal sources, figures and objects for feminist witnessing. In watching how feminist activists improvise with sources, figures and objects of legal consciousness on the abortion trail, this article seeks to contribute to critical understanding of a plurality of witnessing practice, particularly as it emerges in diaspora space. Focusing on Murphy’s concept of immodest witnessing, with its attention to bodies, protocols and apparatuses as constituents of knowledge, the article thinks with the diasporic feminist performance group, Speaking of I.M.E.L.D.A., about how they used self-examination, collaboration and knowledge-sharing on the trail to repeal Ireland’s 8th Amendment. The article argues that their improvisation with legal consciousness of reproductive choice enacts ‘cheeky witnessing’. Cheeky witnessing has three dynamics as a method of observation. First, it is messy and irreverent in innovating with names to display the mixed genealogies of feminist knowledge. Second, cheeky witnessing generates novel subject-figures who make connections between different reproductive labourers as observers of the trail in diaspora space. Third, cheeky witnessing places funny objects, knickers in this instance, so as to join up particular public locations and make them more, if unevenly, comfortable for sexual and reproductive bodies. Cheeky witnessing shows us how committed and partial practices play a role in speaking across interests and experiences, in stretching the legal imagination and in sustaining the everyday grind of making a better world.