This article explores how in the forty years since Roe v Wade, a case in which constitutional protections for women’s decision whether to end a pregnancy was founded in the Due Process Clauses, the US Supreme Court came to understand abortion rights as an equality right and a liberty right. The authors explore how equality arguments have appeared in US court decisions, and why it might be politically significant that abortion rights are tied to equality values.

This article explores the Canadian feminist activism which led to constitutional abortion rights established in the SCC case R v Morgentaler in 1988. Part 1 describes covert “back-alley” abortion practices prior and immediately after the 1969 criminal reform. Part II studies how judicial reasoning resulted in the constitutional decisions. Part III explores how Morgentaler 1988 de-radicalized abortion rights.

This article discusses the German Constitutional Court’s decision on abortion rights, that the state was under a constitutional duty to protect the foetus from deprivations of its interest in life by the pregnant woman. The authors suggest that Canadian constitutional law academics and advocates for reproductive rights could benefit from studying the German abortion decisions, despite the surrounding controversy. The author argues that the protective nature of this constitutional decision can help clarify constitutional doctrine, as this is a factor present in many difficult constitutional cases. The German decision imposed protective obligations on the state of vulnerable constitutional rights-holders who are peculiarly vulnerable to the actions of private actors and identified as constitutional certain interests pursued by the state through measures that infringe constitutional rights.

This article analyses how reproductive justice has been addressed by the InterAmerican Human Rights System through case law, hearings and thematic reports. The authors of the paper suggest that although reproductive rights have been integrated in the human rights frameworks, much remains to be done to apply these rights in Latin America. Further, it is put forth that until access to legal abortion, emergency contraception and reproductive techniques among other things are interpreted as a part of human rights, gender inequality will persist. Moreover, despite the significance of international jurisprudence addressing reproductive rights, until the socioeconomic and societal barriers which prevent regional judges from integrating international law into domestic law, gender equality and reproductive rights will be at risk.  

Persons with disabilities experience inequalities in reproductive and parenting rights. This article begins with an overview of sexual and parenting rights regarding disabled peoples. The author specifically focuses on the frequency of sterilization amongst disabled populations, and the reasons, provided from multiple different populations, used to justify these procedures. Next, the article examines the obligations of various nations regarding rights to access to reproductive health. Finally, the article concludes by pressing the need for future research to examine the complex issues surrounding the reproductive rights of disabled peoples. 

This article assesses the impact of international human rights law on challenging the prohibitions on abortion in Latin America. The author focuses on analyzing four significant international challenges brought against Peru, Mexico, and El Salvador. She argues that the overall impact of international human rights law has been relatively limited and overwhelmingly late. The reasons provided for this are numerous, however, attention is particularly focused on the controversies surrounded by abortion. Consequently, the author suggests that by progressively challenging prevailing attitudes, taking affirmative measures to eradicate social barriers that inhibit women, and challenging gender stereotypes can assist in developing abortion rights in latin America.

This article discusses wartime female slavery. It looks at three incidents of wartime female slavery: crimes committed against comfort women by the Japanese military during WWII, wartime female slavery endured by Bosnian females in the Foca region, and crimes committed by soldiers in Sierra Leone against women who were abducted, raped, and forced into conjugal relations. The article looked at how the issue of the comfort women was treated by international courts and tribunals after the end of WWII and how this has created precedent for later instances of female enslavement.  The article states that the Tokyo Tribunal’s failure to condemn the subjugation of comfort women under either humanitarian law or international criminal law was a significant legal error. The article also looks as misperceptions of wartime slavery that had resulted from the post WWII failure of addressing and clearly defining female enslavement in all of its forms.

This article looks at the effects of ratification of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) on reproductive rights. The article describes CEDAW’s broad prohibition against the reproduction of gender including sexual division of labour based on biological differences which some feminist scholars have identifies as the bedrock for women’s subordination. The article also explains why the denial of reproductive rights reproduces gender hierarchy. The article looks at how this plays out transnationally by state and non-state actors. The article looks at the arguments of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Professors Sylvia Law, Reva Siegel and others who argue that reproductive rights should be grounded in equality rather than privacy. The article also discusses opposing views concerning whether CEDAW is abortion neutral.

This article discusses utilizing an international human rights framework as a tool for gender, sexuality, and women’s rights advocacy in the USA and Canada and to reflect on the potential for domestic impact litigation in the Caribbean and Latin America. The article discusses an approach that involves bridging geographic, linguistic, conceptual, and professional divides to foster the development of an “Inter-American Gender Justice Network” in the Western hemisphere. Three landmark cases are discussed, Jessica Lenahan (Gonzales) v United States, In re Campo Algodonero, and Karen Atala v Chile. These cases are all landmark cases for the Inter-American Court on Human Rights. The article discusses both positive and negative movements in the Western hemisphere that have gained traction lately.

This article looks at the issue of time in abortion laws. Time is a very important factor in abortion laws because the laws often relate or refer to gestational age and length or pregnancy. This article focuses on three struggles over time in abortion laws: those related to morality, health and justice. The article concludes that in respect to morality, collective faith and trust should ultimately be placed in the moral judgement of those most affected; the pregnant women. The article concludes that in respect to health, abortions laws need to be more evidence based to counter the stigma associated with abortions which currently results in overregulation and access barriers. The article concludes that in respect to justice, it is important to recognize that abortion services need to be safe, legal, and accessible.