Understanding the violation of directive anti-abortion counselling [and cisnormativity]: Obstruction to access or reproductive violence?

abstract

The Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Act stipulates that abortion counselling should be non-directive (and voluntary) and makes it a criminal offence to obstruct access to legal services. Thus, there is scope for directive abortion counselling, referred to in this article as coercive abortion counselling, to be framed as obstruction to access. Alternatively, coercive abortion counselling may be framed as reproductive violence: as an attempt at and manifestation of reproductive control. In this article, I draw on research on abortion counselling experiences which was conducted at three public hospitals in the Eastern Cape province among 30 black (cis) women and four healthcare providers. I briefly describe the coercive anti-abortion counselling practices, which served the function of preventing (future) unintended pregnancy and abortion. I highlight the normative discourses which underpin the practices referred to and describe some of the (cis) women’s experiences of these.

I then apply the languages of obstruction to access and reproductive violence, in turn, to understand the coercive anti-abortion counselling practices and experiences thereof. I argue that the language of reproductive violence, framed by an Afro-feminist approach, may be more productive in understanding the reproductive control that directive abortion counselling seeks to achieve and the harm it causes. However, this is contingent on a necessary recognition of the sex and gender diversity of people with the capacity to gestate and the de-centring and de-anchoring of cis women as default and therefore the only legitimate gestational subjects. This will enable a recognition of the various manifestations of reproductive violence, and may enable us to better respond to and prevent these violences.

keywords:

• legal abortion
• directive anti-abortion counselling
• obstruction to access
• reproductive violence
• Afrofeminism
• South Africa

Notes

1 Used here to refer to the privileging of cisgendered people (people who identify with the gender they were assigned at birth) in a variety of ways and spheres.

2 Used here to refer to the regulation of reproduction based on the normalisation and privileging of reproduction (compared to not reproducing) (Franke 2001) and based on ideas about ‘normal’ reproduction and who should and should not (be allowed to) reproduce (Weissman 2017).

3 Of course, systems of power interact in ways that mean that parenthood is not encouraged nor enforced for all cis women, and that mean that the enforcement or denial of parenthood is based on the categorisation of individuals, groups and communities into ‘desirable’ and ‘undesirable’ reproducers (Ross 2017).

4 I use ‘foetus/child’ to recognise that abortion seekers (and pregnant people more generally) have different relationships to their pregnancies. Also, to resist both the ‘pro-life’ and ‘pro-choice’ movements’ tendencies to prescribe (albeit in different ways) how pregnant people should relate to their pregnancies.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jabulile Mary-Jane Jace Mavuso

JABULILE MARY-JANE JACE MAVUSO is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Pretoria, and 2020 recipient of the Paula Kantor Award by the International Centre for Research on Women (ICRW). They hold a PhD in Psychology from Rhodes University, where they are a Research Associate for the CSSR. Their interests lie in gender, race, sexualities and reproduction, and sexual and reproductive justice. Their most recent research focused on abortion narratives. Published work encompasses abortion, adolescent pregnancy decision-making, sexual violence policy at higher institutions, and African feminisms and decolonial psychology. They have published work in journals including Culture, Health & Sexuality, Nursing Inquiry and PINS.