Abortion Beyond the Law: Building a Global Feminist Movement for Self-Managed Abortion

by Naomi Braine

How feminists across Latin America, Africa, and Europe are making self-managed abortion available to all–and the strong transnational feminist movement they have built along the way

The feminists across Latin America, Africa, and Europe making self-managed abortion available to all - and the transnational movement they have built along the way

Drawing on years of research with activists around the world, sociologist Naomi Braine describes the strategies, politics, and tactics of direct action feminists bringing abortion pills, information, and support to people seeking to end unwanted pregnancies. From combatting the legal strictures of Bolsonaro's Brazil, to navigating the NGO-dominated landscape of Kenya and Nigeria, feminist activists are making safe, accessible abortion care available against the odds.

Even more important, these women are building a robust transnational feminist network. Tactics developed in the Global South - hotlines, practices of accompaniment and peer-to-peer care, and scientific information - are now being shared with activists in Europe and North America, building a new model for international feminist solidarity.

Genres: Feminism, Nonfiction, Politics, Activism

240 pages, Paperback

Published November 14, 2023

Reviews

[Ghazalehsadr · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book was not what I expected it to be. The entire thing could have been said in no more than 10 pages, because it is all repetition after repetition. It is basically a report rather than a book, a long report with numbers and data on the SMA movement in specific areas and regions which could only be useful for a researcher or student writing an article or thesis on the subject. But for the general reader, like me, it was so repetitive and dry and dull.

[Georgia Brohier · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quite an academic text but so incredibly insightful. It was particularly interesting when Naomi brought attention to how western countries where abortion rights have been challenged and restricted more recently can learn from the global south in approaching self managed abortion.

“A safe abortion should be a normal reality, and the power of this movement has been to create this reality - or at least the potential for it - outside the control of laws and medical institutions through building communities of solidarity.”

[Victor Ogungbamigbe · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting sociological study on the SMA movement. While I found the stories extremely compelling and am truly in awe of the people driving this movement forward, the sociological perspective just made it a very dry read. I would have preferred a more narrative driven approach to the stories of the activists; I found the quotes from the members of the hotlines and NGOs the most enjoyable sections of the book. I would still recommend it as the women activists are truly doing amazing and life changing work, and their stories deserve to be told.

[Lotus · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is good! A required reading for understanding the social aspects of SMA and the Modern abortion landscape, regardless of where you are. This book is great for its focus on abortion collectives in Latin America especially in describing the kinds of actions these orgs do, their histories, and also the general vibes of these collectives as a whole. Unfortunately it's sections on African NGOs struggle to paint a picture of the evolution of the NGOS and their political identities. I think this is half out of concern of repeating the points preexisting writing on globally funded NGOs in Africa and half out of concern that a dive into the political identities and lives of paid employees would look less radical than bad ass lawbreaking lesbian feminists delivering pills. We get hints of really interesting stuff but when Naomi wants to make a point about "the movement" we go to South America.

I think that the core argument of some sort of unified yet decentralized radical feminist justice solidarity work is (kind of) challenged by these NGOs and collectivess being talked about in the same breath. Like, of course these NGOs do incredible work at reproductive rights organizations but what does it mean to have commitment to these things as a paid job, is that job itself part of the revolutionary struggle what of the nonprofit industrial complex plays into their work. Does their official status seperate them from Latam collectives in unofficial contexts? I'm being told that im reading about radical history but half the history seems radical and the other seems mundane. But that conclusion feels lazy, like the author finds African NGOs uninteresting (or just didnt find a lot of ppl to interview ) so now I as a reviewer am there too. when really I want to know everything about these women Latam activists get a paragraphs but African feminists? activists? employees? get sentence fragments. This is especially ridiculous given complex African Harm Reduction Histories, it feels like i missed their chapter but no I have no clue how these women get pills and how their work connects to people other than their job descriptions. Bummer!
^This most certainly is one of those chicken after the egg situations where the popularity of this book in movement spaces in part leads to a greater spotlight on Latam approaches to accompaniment & hotlines so I approach the book with greater knowledge on that aspect and want to know more about something that's new to me (when perhaps readers who first read the book knew a lot about NGO-activism and little about collectives). But still that disparity of information is a lot, though in all honesty the book is kind of hard to follow its repetitive but the repetition doesn't give clarifying information more on that later.

Similarly I wish the author paid more attention to nuances in what weighty terms like feminism, reproductive justice, and choice-feminism mean in contexts much different from the U.S..

Choice-feminism to me is often the white single issue nonprofit lady who makes concessions as soon as laws change but will also ask for the bare minimum in stark-contrast repro-justice which is holistic and aims to fight for a better world for everyone. This dichotomy is clear to me, and to those in my book club, because of specific US racial and historical dynamics. But what does it mean for a once illegal/quasi-legal hotline to make the jump to legal status? What does a grassroots feminist NGO owe to its community? What does lesbian feminism mean to abortion providers in Chile and Argentina? I understand that this isn't a history book but little insight to the nuances of these ideas in different places would be so helpful. It doesn't help that terms like '(de)medicalization' are used over 20 times before they're given a clear explanation in the 2nd half of the book. Confusion around that term took up most of my 1st session of book club because what does it mean to demedicalize as a nonprofit collaborating with telehealth organizations, which yes its a new development but that doesnt mean its as radical as is implied.

Regardless of my issues with some writing choices I really enjoyed this book, shit is completely and undeniably cool. I honestly think Braine weaves together lot of really nuanced histories in a way that makes sense in my brain tingle. It is required reading but when Braine is at their best they're smooth with it. The research is clearly high quality and it shows Braine always has a good conclusion to a thread and most questions I had at the beginning of the book were answered thoroughly. I don't like that the book assumes that you can/should simply recontextualize terms/orgs with ur American gaze but I infact can do that and had a fine time. I also apricate her methods of complete anonymity, it at times was hard to follow, but its the type of thing I expect from simalir writing in the future. I appreciate that Naomi is super respectful and clearly tries to meet every person interviewed and the topic itself where its at. When Braine inserts herself into the narrative especially with regards to the connections to the harm reduction movement it feels completely appropriate and helpful. This book is already dated just by its nature as a book on the landscape of abortion activism that was released in 2021, but that comes with the perk of being a time capsule of the last decade of SMA organizing.

Hope future works of this nature really dive into African abortion histories and Asian histories as well. Sociologists tend to write books that are less history and more current structural analysis so I understand why broaching those topics was more difficult because you have to go beyond basic context. In splitting my time between sociologists & antropoligists+historians im really loving the sociology stuff more. Regardless another writer needs to do that work if they haven't already. Super excited to scavenge the work cited list.

[Jola · Rating 5 out of 5]

this book teaches one about the ways of organizing and accompanying self managed abortion, starting from spreading information and possibilities for contact, going over to accompaniment and demedicalized research. it focuses on activism in south america and africa, decolonializing our knowledge on political work by centering around community care and solidarity. i learned a lot about activism on the verge of legality, about criminalization of political work and the balance of clandestinity and protection, and spreading the message and being reachable.
i like the intersectionality of this political fight, the international/global networks of solidarity and the rather underrepresented perspective of activism in the global south.

(also it is written by a queer person and acknowledges the gender spectrum of people in need of abortions and queer perspectives within the movement, yay!)

[kayleigh · Rating 5 out of 5]

the most compelling and interesting book i’ve read on this topic. i’m considering this for my dissertation and was shocked to learn so much i hadn’t heard of before.

[Joshua Lawrence · Rating 4 out of 5]

Most sections of chapters hit, those that are missed can be sped-read through. Pretty jargon-free and accessible to anyone interested in reproduction right.

It’s really worth checking out!