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Abstract
This paper aims to demonstrate how the discourse of reproductive rights, led by the Global North, is close to a eugenic bias based on population control, and exercises direct influence in countries of the Global South, such as Brazil. To this end, I demonstrate that entities such as Planned Parenthood International (IPPF), have considerable relevance in national and international spaces dedicated to debate on reproductive rights and thereby influence the production of eugenicist and colonial speeches about the countries of the Global South. Applying a Black feminist lens of reproductive justice to the Brazilian context, this article shows how discourses relating to the birth control of Black and poor Brazilian women were absorbed by Brazil when the country oversaw a mass sterilisation process under the influence of the United States between 1970 and 1990. I further demonstrate how such eugenicist policies still remain in force in the Brazilian State today, which in 2018 carried out, through its judiciary, a forced sterilisation surgery on Janaína Quirino, a poor Black Brazilian and woman. This analysis shows that the colonial discourse regarding the control of so-called disposable populations never left the country, being institutionalised even by the entities that should protect (and not violate) Brazilian women.
Notes
1 Antônio Mazzeo, Estado e burguesia no Brasil (Boitempo, 2015).
2 Lélia Gonzales, Por um feminismo afro-latino-americano (Zahar, 2020).
3 Maria Isabel Rodrigues, Política demográfica e parlamento: debates e decisões sobre o controle da natalidade (Doctoral Thesis, State University of Campinas, 1992).
4 Seamus Grimes, ‘The Ideology of Population Control in the UN Draft Plan for Cairo’ (1992) 13 Population Research and Policy Review 209.
5 Edméia Coelho, Maria Lucena and Ana Silva, ‘O planejamento familiar no Brasil no contexto das políticas públicas de saúde: determinantes históricos’ (2000) 34(1) Revista da Escola de Enfermagem USP 37.
6 A. Nyberg, ‘Achieving Reproductive Justice: Some Implications of Race for Abortion Activism in Northern Ireland’ (2020) 124(1) Feminist Review 165, 66.
7 Aníbal Quijano and Immanuel Wallerstein, ‘Americanity as a Concept, or the Americas in the Modern World-System’ (1992) 134 International Social Science Journal 549.
8 Eric Sheppard and Richa Nagar, ‘From East–West to North–South’ Caroline (2004) Antipode 560.
9 Brazil, Exame da incidência da esterilização em massa de mulheres no Brasil Examination of the incidence of mass sterilization in brazilian women (online) 1993 <http://www2.senado.leg.br/bdsf/bitstream/handle/id/85082/CPMIEsterilizacao.pdf?sequence=7> (last accessed 14 october 2020) at 110.
10 José Alves, As políticas populacionais e o planejamento familiar na América Latina e no Brasil (Escola Nacional de Ciências Estatísticas, 2006) 25.
11 Mary del Priore, Ao sul do corpo: condição feminina, maternidades e mentalidades no Brasil colônia (Editora Unesp, 2009).
12 Aime Césaire, Discurso sobre o colonialismo (Veneta, 2020).
13 As above.
14 Lélia Gonzales, Por um feminismo afro-latino-americano (Zahar, 2020) 169.
15 As above.
16 As above.
17 As above.
18 Gilberto Freyre, Casa-grande e Senzala (Global, 2004).
19 As above.
20 Brazil, Law-Decree n. 7,967 (1945). [emphasis my own].
21 Rodrigues above note 3.
22 As above at 38.
23 As above at 39.
24 As above at 16.
25 As above at 16.
26 As above.
27 Which received financial support from foundations such as Rockefeller Foundation, William and Flora Hewlett and from The Nacional Research Council Fund.
28 Rodrigues above note 3 at 30.
29 As above at 31.
30 Among the organisations that mediated the resources were the United Nations Fund for Populations Activities (UNFPA), the World Bank, the World Health Organization (WHO), International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF), the Association for Voluntary Contraception (AVSC), Church World Service (CWS), Development Associates (DA), Family Planning International Assistance (FPIA), International Federation for Family Life Promotion (IFFLP), Johns Hopkins Program for International Education in Genecology and Obstetries (JHPIEGO), Johns Hopkins University; Population, Communication Services (PCS), Population Information Program (PIP), JohnSnow, Inc. (JSI), The Pathfinder Fund, The Population Council and World Neighbors (WN). From the late 1980s this large group of organisations, all of whom with financial ties to the United States, started provided resources for the implementation of birth control policies in Brazil. As above, at 31.
31 As above.
32 Horácio Rodrigues and Amanda Oliveira, ‘Blessed be the Fruit: resquícios de um viés controlista em ações sobre cirurgia de laqueadura no Judiciário de Santa Catarina (2015–2016)’ (2019) 15(1) Direito GV.
33 ‘The subcutaneous contraceptive implant comes in the form of a small rod that is placed under the skin in the upper non-dominant arm. It releases a continuous dose of the progestin etonogestrel, which causes the cervix to secrete a very thick mucus that blocks entry of sperm into the uterus. The implant will also inhibit ovulation and promotes the thinning of the endometrial lining of the uterus, which may alleviate menstrual discomfort and reduce the flow.’ Subcutaneous Contraceptive Implants (online) <https://www.orangeblossomwomensgroup.com/contents/obgyn-services/gynecology-1/subcutaneous-contraceptive-implants>
34 Renata Teixeira Jardim, O Controle da reprodução: estudo etnográfico da prática contraceptiva de implantes subcutâneos na cidade de Porto Alegre/RS (Master Thesis, University of Rio Grande do Sul, 2009).
35 Luthianne Lunardi and Taciana Cervi. ‘Maria – Interditada e esterilizada: reflexões jurídicas acerca do transtorno mental’ (2020) 17(1) Revista Jurídica Da FA7 95.
36 Quilombo is a Brazilian hinterland settlement founded by people of African origin. Most of the inhabitants of quilombos, called quilombolas, were escaped slaves. See: Assis Junior, ‘Kilómbo’, Dicionário kimbundu-português (Luanda Argente, n.d.). Available at: <https://archive.org/details/dicionriokimbu00assiuoft/page/8/mode/2up>
37 Gracinha case: 6 years ago the quilombola lost their daughters to the State (online) <https://catarinas.info/caso-gracinha-ha-6-anos-a-quilombola-perdia-as-filhas-para-o-estado/>.
38 Mariana Damasco, Marcos Maio and Simone Monteiro. ‘Feminismo negro: raça, identidade e saúde reprodutiva no Brasil (1975–1993)’ (2012) 20(1) Estudos Feministas 133.
39 As above at 138.
40 As above at 133.
41 As above at 133.
42 Loretta J. Ross, ‘Reproductive Justice as Intersectional Feminist Activism’ (2017) 19(3) Souls 290.
43 Reproductive Justice (online) <https://www.sistersong.net/reproductive-justice> (last accessed 18 May 2021).
44 Loreta Ross, Sarah Brownlee and Dázon Dixom, ‘The “SisterSong Collective”: Women of Color, Reproductive Health and Human Rights’ (2001) 17(1) American Journal of Health Studies 79.
45 D. Roberts, ‘Reproductive Justice, Not Just Rights’ (2015) 62(4) Dissent 80.
46 R. Rebouché, ‘Reproducing Rights: the Intersection of Reproductive Justice and Human Rights’ (2017) 7(1) UC Irvine L. Rev. 7, 593–594.
47 Loretta J. Ross, ‘Reproductive Justice as Intersectional Feminist Activism’ (2017) 19(3) Souls 290.
48 These investigations, called Comissão Parlamentar Mista de Inquérito (CPMI) are conducted by deputies and senators on bills and topics that are of national interest. However, this investigation does not have the power to punish those involved in the complaint; at the end, a report is drawn up and sent to the Public Prosecutor's Office to take the appropriate measures.
49 Mariana Damasco, Marcos Maio and Simone Monteiro. ‘Feminismo negro: raça, identidade e saúde reprodutiva no Brasil (1975–1993)’ (2012) 20(1) Estudos Feministas 133. Black militant Luiza Bairros played an important role, providing documents with the aim of demonstrating that spaces where Black Women were majority had higher numbers of sterilisation, especially during the 1980s. In fact, the 1986 National Household Sample Survey (PNAD) showed a high rate of sterilised women in the mostly Black regions of Brazil. These data added to the aforementioned document The 1980 Census in Brazil and in the State of São Paulo and its curiosities and concerns, as well as the outdoor campaigns run in Salvador, triggered a massive movement of Black Women. One of the main movements was the National Campaign against the Sterilization of Black Women, started in November 1990 and led by Black doctor and activist Jurema Werneck whose slogan was ‘Sterilization – From birth control to the genocide of the Black People!’.
50 Brazil above note 9.
51 Edméia Coelho, Maria Lucena and Ana Silva, ‘O planejamento familiar no Brasil no contexto das políticas públicas de saúde: determinantes históricos’ (2000) 34(1) Revista da Escola de Enfermagem USP 37.
52 Brazil above note 9.
53 As above.
54 As above.
55 Sabrina Silva, Planejamento familiar ou esterilização em massa de mulheres negras?: O relatório da Comissão Parlamentar Mista de Inquérito (CPMI) de 1993 (Undergraduate Thesis, University of Brasília, 2018).
56 Brazil above note 9.
57 Silva above note 55.
58 US, NSSM 200 (online) 1974 <https://pdf.usaid.gov/pdf_docs/Pcaab500.pdf> (last accessed 14 october 2020) at 10.
59 Brazil above note 9.
60 Silva, above note 55.
61 Brazil above note 9 at 117.
62 Silva, above note 55. Silva explains that one of the possible explanations for this lies in the biased profiles of those who conducted the investigations: of the 30 parliamentarians, 13 were women; of the 13 women, only deputy Benedita da Silva, who initiated the procedure, was Black.
63 Edna Roland, ‘Direitos reprodutivos e racismo no Brasil’ (1995) 3(2) Estudos Feministas 506.
64 As above.
65 As above at 507.
66 As above at 510.
67 As above.
68 Brazil above note 9 at 10.
69 To check the lawsuit, access the site http://www.tjsp.jus.br/ and inform the number 1001521–57.2017.8.26.0360.
70 Case number 1001521–57.2017.8.26.0360. Tribunal de Justiça de São Paulo, Brazil (2017).
71 As above at 4.
72 As above at 4–5.
73 As above.
74 As above at 6 emphasis my own.
75 As above at 17.
76 As above at 12.
77 As above at 66.
78 As above at 81–82.
79 As above at 50 emphasis my own.
80 As above.
81 As above at 118.
82 As above at 145.
83 As above at 163–168.
84 For more cases, see: Jardim above note 34; Lunardi and Cervi above note 35; Gracinha case: 6 years ago the quilombola lost their daughters to the State. See more in: <https://catarinas.info/caso-gracinha-ha-6-anos-a-quilombola-perdia-as-filhas-para-o-estado/>.