Racist and patriarchal ideas underpin the new ‘family planning’ initiatives promoted by DfID, USAID and the Gates Foundation which deny women in the global South real control over their bodies. The appropriation of the notion of ‘women’s right to choose’ for neoliberal population control must be c
George Orwell’s “1984” is alive and well in Spain as the Minister for Justice talks- up plans to deny women the right to an abortion, says Liz Cooper
The death of Savita Halappanavar lifted the lid on the church, the state, and women's reproductive rights in the Republic of Ireland, and has been the catalyst for the new legislation on the rights of pregnant women proposed last week.
In America and Ghana two men have recently faced the courts for abusing women patients and performing dangerous late-term abortions. These cases reveal the true impact of the lack of comprehensive reproductive health care, and accessible, legal, safe abortions.
Where the female body - through its societal projections in media, art, politics and religion - has always formed the first port of women's oppression, it is necessary to consider whether attempts to reclaim it through topless protests in the public arena are more likely to defy or to reify existi
The concept of wilaya (guardianship over women) is key to discrimination against women. Debates over different interpretations of guardianship under Muslim law ultimately fail to address the key premises underlying hegemonic notions of masculinity and femininity and the institutions that propagate
The lack of institutional concern for epidemic levels of sexual harassment and assault in Egypt is part of the larger neglect of the issue of gender equality by the post-revolutionary powers, says Heather McRobie.
The authors of the re-launched Beyond the Fragments take a feminist approach to healing a divided left. They put women’s exploitation by capital firmly on the agenda. But where is the challenge to patriarchy?
In a reply to Rahila Gupta, Celeste West argues that we can’t have meaningful feminism or a meaningful democratic project without ensuring that people have a chance to speak for themselves
There are so many battles yet to be won by feminists that we must not be distracted by internal schisms. If we can identify a shared political goal with trans women, says Rahila Gupta, we should be able to end this polarisation.
Despite women's progress, the norms that dictate that people should act along gender lines are stronger than ever. The rules of gender come first, humanity second. Genderqueers are transforming gender and challenging the constricting gender roles that limit everybody’s lives.
There is much to celebrate from this year’s CSW, but the failure to call for the prevention and elimination of violence against women and girls to be included as a priority in the post 2015 framework, is a clear sign that our work is far from over, says Zohra Moosa
