Realizing Abortion Rights at the Margins of Legality in Mexico

ABSTRACT

I analyze the alternative tactics and logics of Las Fuertes, a feminist organization that has taken an “alegal” approach to realizing the human right to abortion in the conservative Mexican state of Guanajuato. Since a series of United Nations agreements throughout the 1990s enshrined reproductive rights as universal human rights, Mexican feminists have adopted the human rights platform as a lobbying tool to pressure the government to reform restrictive abortion laws. This strategy bore fruit in Mexico City, with passage of the historic 2007 abortion legalization. Las Fuertes has leveraged the human rights strategy differently – to justify the direct provision of local abortion accompaniment in a context of near-total abortion criminalization. By directly seizing abortion rights, rather than seeking to implement them through legalistic channels, Las Fuertes has effectively challenged Mexican reproductive governance in an adversarial political environment.

KEYWORDS:

• Mexico
• abortion
• human rights
• law
• reproductive governance

Acknowledgments

Thanks for this piece go first and foremost to members of the organization I call “Las Fuertes,” for sharing your important work with me. The special issue that this article forms part of grew from a rich and engaging AAA panel – thanks to all of the participants. For editing and conceptual help, thanks go to Merrill Singer, Lynn Morgan, Mounia El Kotni, Daniel Jordan Smith, and members of the Postdoctoral Writing Group at the Population Studies and Training Center at Brown University. Finally, thank you to the three anonymous reviewers at Medical Anthropology.

Notes

1. I use pseudonyms for all organizations, people, and cities to protect anonymity. The leaders of the group I call “Las Fuertes” are open about their work and known public figures. Given the legally ambiguous character of their work, however, I anonymize them to protect against possible legal repercussions. Throughout this article, I use “Las Fuertes” as a singular noun when referring to the organization, and as a plural noun when referring to its members.

2. Not all pharmacies carry misoprostol. Moreover, some pharmacists are beginning to ask for a prescription as they have caught onto the use of misoprostol for self-induced abortion.

3. ICPD Programme of Action, infra doc. Biblio., Ch VIII S 8.25.

4. The use of misoprostol for self-induced abortion has spread across Latin America in recent years, offering a convenient means to bypass restrictive abortion laws on an individual and collective level. In Argentina, where abortion is heavily criminalized, a feminist network called the Socorristas en Red offers medical abortion accompaniment similar to the work of Las Fuertes in Mexico (Santarelli and Anzorena 2017). A Dutch organization called Women on Waves also offers medication-induced abortion services aboard its ship, which strategically sails on international waters to circumvent restrictive national abortion laws. To date, the ship has visited Latin American countries including Mexico (where two women from Guerrero boarded for abortion services), Guatemala, and Portugal.

5. For a full review of Mexican abortion laws by state, see Vela (2010).

6. Articles 159, 160, and 162 of Guanajuato’s Penal Code, respectively.

7. In the MIAAS, misoprostol is taken sublingually (under the tongue), buccally (between the gum and cheek), or vaginally (inserted near the cervix) according to the woman’s preference. Women are instructed to take four pills and then wait four hours for the abortion to occur. If the abortion is not induced, women repeat this process up to three times.

Additional information

Funding

The research and writing for this article was generously supported by the National Science Foundation [DGE-1143954], Wenner-Gren Foundation [8973], and the American Association of University Women. For time to write and think, a postdoctoral Fellowship in the Population Studies and Training Center at Brown University was essential.

Notes on contributors

Elyse Ona Singer

Elyse Ona Singer is an assistant professor of Anthropology at the University of Oklahoma.