{"title":"Guardians of ableist family formation: the legitimation work of Danish abortion committees in cases of termination for fetal anomaly","authors":"","doi":"10.1057/s41292-023-00319-6","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<h3>Abstract</h3> <p>In Denmark, pregnant persons have a statutory right to abortion on-demand in the first trimester of pregnancy, after which abortion must be sanctioned by a regional abortion committee and may be warranted if there is danger that the fetus will suffer a serious mental or physical disability, yet what precisely constitutes ‘danger’ and ‘seriousness’ are left in the hands of the juridical abortion system to interpret. In this article, I explore how jurists and doctors arrive at and legitimate the authorization of disability-selective abortion. Building on van Wichelen’s (Legitimating life: adoption in the age of globalization and biotechnology, Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, 2019) concept of ‘legitimation work,’ I show how abortion committees make legal decisions by dividing and distributing the task of —and moral responsibility for—making life-ending decisions by leaning on established legal practice, what I refer to as <em>bureaucratic legitimation work</em>; risk estimates made by external medical experts, what I refer to as <em>collaborative legitimation work</em>; and the ethical panacea of individual autonomy and informed choice, what I refer to as <em>ethopolitical legitimation work</em>. I argue that in conjunction, these forms of legitimation work turn termination of almost every non-conforming fetus into legitimate acts, hereby safeguarding ableist family formation. </p>","PeriodicalId":46976,"journal":{"name":"Biosocieties","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.3000,"publicationDate":"2024-03-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Biosocieties","FirstCategoryId":"3","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1057/s41292-023-00319-6","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q4","JCRName":"SOCIAL SCIENCES, BIOMEDICAL","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
In Denmark, pregnant persons have a statutory right to abortion on-demand in the first trimester of pregnancy, after which abortion must be sanctioned by a regional abortion committee and may be warranted if there is danger that the fetus will suffer a serious mental or physical disability, yet what precisely constitutes ‘danger’ and ‘seriousness’ are left in the hands of the juridical abortion system to interpret. In this article, I explore how jurists and doctors arrive at and legitimate the authorization of disability-selective abortion. Building on van Wichelen’s (Legitimating life: adoption in the age of globalization and biotechnology, Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, 2019) concept of ‘legitimation work,’ I show how abortion committees make legal decisions by dividing and distributing the task of —and moral responsibility for—making life-ending decisions by leaning on established legal practice, what I refer to as bureaucratic legitimation work; risk estimates made by external medical experts, what I refer to as collaborative legitimation work; and the ethical panacea of individual autonomy and informed choice, what I refer to as ethopolitical legitimation work. I argue that in conjunction, these forms of legitimation work turn termination of almost every non-conforming fetus into legitimate acts, hereby safeguarding ableist family formation.
期刊介绍：
BioSocieties is committed to the scholarly exploration of the crucial social, ethical and policy implications of developments in the life sciences and biomedicine. These developments are increasing our ability to control our own biology; enabling us to create novel life forms; changing our ideas of ‘normality’ and ‘abnormality’; transforming our understanding of personal identity, family relations, ancestry and ‘race’; altering our social and personal expectations and responsibilities; reshaping global economic opportunities and inequalities; creating new global security challenges; and generating new social, ethical, legal and regulatory dilemmas. To address these dilemmas requires us to break out from narrow disciplinary boundaries within the social sciences and humanities, and between these disciplines and the natural sciences, and to develop new ways of thinking about the relations between biology and sociality and between the life sciences and society.
BioSocieties provides a crucial forum where the most rigorous social research and critical analysis of these issues can intersect with the work of leading scientists, social researchers, clinicians, regulators and other stakeholders. BioSocieties defines the key intellectual issues at the science-society interface, and offers pathways to the resolution of the critical local, national and global socio-political challenges that arise from scientific and biomedical advances.
As the first journal of its kind, BioSocieties publishes scholarship across the social science disciplines, and represents a lively and balanced array of perspectives on controversial issues. In its inaugural year BioSocieties demonstrated the constructive potential of interdisciplinary dialogue and debate across the social and natural sciences. We are becoming the journal of choice not only for social scientists, but also for life scientists interested in the larger social, ethical and policy implications of their work. The journal is international in scope, spanning research and developments in all corners of the globe.
BioSocieties is published quarterly, with occasional themed issues that highlight some of the critical questions and problematics of modern biotechnologies. Articles, response pieces, review essays, and self-standing editorial pieces by social and life scientists form a regular part of the journal.
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