Bearing Children, Bearing Risks: Feminist Leadership for Progressive Regulation of Compensated Surrogacy in the United States

Compensated surrogacy-an arrangement in which a woman carries and gives birth to a child for someone else in exchange for money-intimately affects women. Yet, feminist law reformers have not led efforts to regulate this practice in the United States. Their absence is notable given the significant influence of feminist lawmaking in a host of other areas where women\u27s interests are at stake. This lack of feminist law reform leadership can be understood, however, in light of the complex issues that surrogacy raises-complexity that has long divided feminists. In response to efforts to pass surrogacy legislation in Washington State in 2010, Legal Voice, a women\u27s rights organization founded in 1978, worked to develop a progressive, feminist approach to compensated surrogacy. The organization adopted a framework based primarily on two schools of feminist legal thought-an anti-essentialist analysis and a pragmatic approach under the overarching goal of promoting reproductive justice. This Article proposes the application of these principles to the development of any surrogacy legislation. However, my primary purpose is to urge feminist law advocates to take leadership of surrogacy law reform. Whatever the feminist objections to the practice, people increasingly engage in surrogacy arrangements to create families and to help others to do so. But it is the women who hold the least power and face the highest risk of economic exploitation who bear the most significant risks in these arrangements. Thus, it is imperative that progressive feminists meet the challenge of addressing the complexity of compensated surrogacy, and develop a shared agenda for ensuring reproductive justice in the context of assisted reproductive technologies

Bearing Children, Bearing Risks: Feminist Leadership for Progressive Regulation of Compensated Surrogacy in the United States

Compensated surrogacy—an arrangement in which a woman carries and gives birth to a child for someone else in exchange for money—intimately affects women. Yet, feminist law reformers have not led efforts to regulate this practice in the United States. Their absence is notable given the significant influence of feminist lawmaking in a host of other areas where women’s interests are at stake. This lack of feminist law reform leadership can be understood, however, in light of the complex issues that surrogacy raises—complexity that has long divided feminists. In response to efforts to pass surrogacy legislation in Washington State in 2010, Legal Voice, a women’s rights organization founded in 1978, worked to develop a progressive, feminist approach to compensated surrogacy. The organization adopted a framework based primarily on two schools of feminist legal thought—an anti-essentialist analysis and a pragmatic approach—under the overarching goal of promoting reproductive justice. This Article proposes the application of these principles to the development of any surrogacy legislation. However, my primary purpose is to urge feminist law advocates to take leadership of surrogacy law reform. Whatever the feminist objections to the practice, people increasingly engage in surrogacy arrangements to create families and to help others to do so. But it is the women who hold the least power and face the highest risk of economic exploitation who bear the most significant risks in these arrangements. Thus, it is imperative that progressive feminists meet the challenge of addressing the complexity of compensated surrogacy, and develop a shared agenda for ensuring reproductive justice in the context of assisted reproductive technologies

Bearing Children, Bearing Risks: Feminist Leadership for Progressive Regulation of Compensated Surrogacy in the United States

Compensated surrogacy—an arrangement in which a woman carries and gives birth to a child for someone else in exchange for money—intimately affects women. Yet, feminist law reformers have not led efforts to regulate this practice in the United States. Their absence is notable given the significant influence of feminist lawmaking in a host of other areas where women’s interests are at stake. This lack of feminist law reform leadership can be understood, however, in light of the complex issues that surrogacy raises—complexity that has long divided feminists. In response to efforts to pass surrogacy legislation in Washington State in 2010, Legal Voice, a women’s rights organization founded in 1978, worked to develop a progressive, feminist approach to compensated surrogacy. The organization adopted a framework based primarily on two schools of feminist legal thought—an anti-essentialist analysis and a pragmatic approach—under the overarching goal of promoting reproductive justice. This Article proposes the application of these principles to the development of any surrogacy legislation. However, my primary purpose is to urge feminist law advocates to take leadership of surrogacy law reform. Whatever the feminist objections to the practice, people increasingly engage in surrogacy arrangements to create families and to help others to do so. But it is the women who hold the least power and face the highest risk of economic exploitation who bear the most significant risks in these arrangements. Thus, it is imperative that progressive feminists meet the challenge of addressing the complexity of compensated surrogacy, and develop a shared agenda for ensuring reproductive justice in the context of assisted reproductive technologies

“If They Hand You a Paper, You Sign It”: A Call to End the Sterilization of Women in Prison

The context in which the sterilization of incarcerated women takes place is a deeply coercive one. The practice of sterilizing incarcerated women, whether intentionally coerced or not, takes place against a backdrop of mass incarceration and the long and ignominious history of forced and coerced sterilizations directed at poor people and women of color in the United States. Professor Sara Ainsworth and Dr. Rachel Roth explore this backdrop, and the federal sterilization regulations that arose from this history and from women\u27s activism to change it, in Part I. In Part II, they explain how the appallingly bad and often unconstitutional state of medical care in prison forms the context for both indirect and direct forms of sterilization abuse in prison. They describe careless or aggressive medical treatment that results in infertility, present a case study of sterilizations in California, and analyze state prison policies that permit sterilization. Part III explores medical ethics and the lack of guidance from professional medical organizations on this issue. They conclude by addressing claims that access to sterilization is necessary for incarcerated women\u27s reproductive autonomy, and making specific recommendations against the practice of sterilizing women in prison

The next generation fungal diversity researcher

Fungi are more important to our lives than is assumed by the general public. They can comprise both devastating pathogens and plant-associated mutualists in nature, and several species have also become important workhorses of biotechnology. Fungal diversity research has in a short time transcended from a low-tech research area to a method-intensive high-tech discipline. With the advent of the new genomic and post-genomic methodologies, large quantities of new fungal data are currently becoming available each year. Whilst these new data and methodologies may help modern fungal diversity researchers to explore and discover the yet hidden diversity within a context of biological processes and organismal diversity, they need to be reconciled with the traditional approaches. Such a synthesis is actually difficult to accomplish given the current discouraging situation of fungal biology education, especially in the areas of biodiversity and taxonomic research. The number of fungal diversity researchers and taxonomists in academic institutions is decreasing, as are opportunities for mycological education in international curricula. How can we educate and stimulate students to pursue a career in fungal diversity research and taxonomy and avoid the situation whereby only those few institutions with strong financial support are able to conduct excellent research? Our short answer is that we need a combination of increased specialization and increased collaboration, i.e. that scientists with specialized expertise (e.g., in data generation, compilation, interpretation, and communication) consistently work together to generate and deliver new fungal knowledge in a more integrative manner – closing the gap between both traditional and modern approaches and academic and non-academic environments. Here we discuss how this perspective could be implemented in the training of the ‘next generation fungal diversity researcher’

Current knowledge, status and future for plant and fungal diversity in Great Britain and the UK Overseas Territories

Societal Impact Statement We rely on plants and fungi for most aspects of our lives. Yet plants and fungi are under threat, and we risk losing species before we know their identity, roles, and potential uses. Knowing names, distributions, and threats are first steps toward effective conservation action. Accessible products like field guides and online resources engage society, harnessing collective support for conservation. Here, we review current knowledge of the plants and fungi of the UK and UK Overseas Territories, highlighting gaps to help direct future research efforts toward conserving these vital elements of biodiversity. Summary This review summarizes current knowledge of the status and threats to the plants and fungi of Great Britain and the UK Overseas Territories (UKOTs). Although the body of knowledge is considerable, the distribution of information varies substantially, and we highlight knowledge gaps. The UK vascular flora is the most well studied and we have a relatively clear picture of its 9,001 native and alien taxa. We have seedbanked 72% of the native and archaeophyte angiosperm taxa and 78% of threatened taxa. Knowledge of the UKOTs flora varies across territories and we report a UKOTs flora comprising 4,093 native and alien taxa. We have conserved 27% of the native flora and 51% of the threatened vascular plants in Kew's Millennium Seed Bank, UK. We need a better understanding of the conservation status of plants in the wild, and progress toward completion or updating national red lists varies. Site‐based protection of key plant assemblages is outlined, and progress in identifying Important Plant Areas analyzed. Knowledge of the non‐vascular flora, especially seaweeds remains patchy, particularly in many UKOTs. The biggest gaps overall are in fungi, particularly non‐lichenized fungi. Considerable investment is needed to fill these knowledge gaps and instigate effective conservation strategies