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The Means of Reproduction: Sex, Power, and the Future of the World
In this groundbreaking work of investigative journalism by the author of the New York Times bestseller Kingdom Coming, Michelle Goldberg exposes the global war on women's reproductive rights and its disastrous and unreported consequences for the future of global development
Women's rights are often treated as mere appendages to great questions of war, peace, poverty, and economic development. But as networks of religious fundamentalists, feminists, and bureaucrats struggle to remake sexual and childbearing norms worldwide, the battle to control women's bodies has become a high-stakes enterprise, with the United States often supporting the most reactionary forces.In a work of incisive cultural analysis and deep reporting, Michelle Goldberg shows how the emancipation of women has become the key human rights struggle of the twenty-first century. The Means of Reproduction travels through four continents, examining issues such as abortion, female circumcision, and Asia's missing girls to show how the battle over women's bodies has been globalized and how, too often, the United States has joined sworn enemies such as Iran and Sudan in an axis of repression. Reporting with unique insight from both the rarefied realm of international policy and from individual women's lives, Goldberg elucidates the economic, demographic, and health consequences of women's oppression, which affect more than half the world's population.
As The Means of Reproduction reveals, the conflict between self-determination and patriarchal tradition has come to define pressing questions of global development. Empowering women is the key to retarding the progress of AIDS, curbing overpopulation, and helping the third world climb out of poverty, but attempts to improve women's status elicit fierce opposition from conservatives who see women's submission as key to their own national or religious identity.
From the anticommunist genesis of America's attempts to stem population growth in poor countries to the current worldwide attack on women's rights as a decadent Western imposition, Goldberg explores the interplay between the great issues of our time and the politics of sex and childbearing. Finally, The Means of Reproduction shows how women, strengthened by a solidarity that transcends borders, are fighting for freedom.
Women's rights are often treated as mere appendages to great questions of war, peace, poverty, and economic development. But as networks of religious fundamentalists, feminists, and bureaucrats struggle to remake sexual and childbearing norms worldwide, the battle to control women's bodies has become a high-stakes enterprise, with the United States often supporting the most reactionary forces.In a work of incisive cultural analysis and deep reporting, Michelle Goldberg shows how the emancipation of women has become the key human rights struggle of the twenty-first century. The Means of Reproduction travels through four continents, examining issues such as abortion, female circumcision, and Asia's missing girls to show how the battle over women's bodies has been globalized and how, too often, the United States has joined sworn enemies such as Iran and Sudan in an axis of repression. Reporting with unique insight from both the rarefied realm of international policy and from individual women's lives, Goldberg elucidates the economic, demographic, and health consequences of women's oppression, which affect more than half the world's population.
As The Means of Reproduction reveals, the conflict between self-determination and patriarchal tradition has come to define pressing questions of global development. Empowering women is the key to retarding the progress of AIDS, curbing overpopulation, and helping the third world climb out of poverty, but attempts to improve women's status elicit fierce opposition from conservatives who see women's submission as key to their own national or religious identity.
From the anticommunist genesis of America's attempts to stem population growth in poor countries to the current worldwide attack on women's rights as a decadent Western imposition, Goldberg explores the interplay between the great issues of our time and the politics of sex and childbearing. Finally, The Means of Reproduction shows how women, strengthened by a solidarity that transcends borders, are fighting for freedom.
284 pages, Kindle Edition
First published February 20, 2009
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About the author
Michelle Goldberg
10 books113 followers"Michelle Goldberg is a journalist and the author of the book, Kingdom Coming: The Rise of Christian Nationalism. She is a former contributing writer at Salon.com and blogs at The Huffington Post. Her work has been published in the magazines Rolling Stone and In These Times, and in The New York Observer, The Guardian, Newsday, and other newspapers.
Goldberg earmed a Master's degree in journalism from the University of California, Berkeley and teaches as an adjunct "teaching professional" at New York University’s Graduate School of Journalism. She serves on the advisory board of the Campaign to Defend the Constitution, an organization dedicated to opposing the religious right."
-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelle...
Goldberg earmed a Master's degree in journalism from the University of California, Berkeley and teaches as an adjunct "teaching professional" at New York University’s Graduate School of Journalism. She serves on the advisory board of the Campaign to Defend the Constitution, an organization dedicated to opposing the religious right."
-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelle...
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 103 reviews
April 21, 2018
3.5 stars
A fascinating, in-depth examination of women's reproductive rights from an international perspective over the past 50 or 60 years. Michelle Goldberg shares the economic, health, and demographic consequences of countries and policies that prevent women from having control over their own bodies. Exploring Africa, Asia, Europe, and more, she connects the overarching oppression of women to the daily feelings and struggles of individual women worldwide. Goldberg addresses how complex issues like population control and feminist movements interact in unique, context-specific ways. On a personal note, reading this book made me even more mad at America's religious conservatives who blockade women's access to abortion overseas; our country's imperialism often causes so much harm. One quote about childbearing and liberation I liked:
"There is abundant evidence that if you want women in modern economies to have more babies, you need to help them reconcile work and childbearing, not encourage their subjection. In developing countries a lower status for women is associated with higher fertility, but once societies become highly industrialized and women taste a certain amount of liberation, the opposite is true. 'Whereas previously the countries with the highest period fertility rates were those in which family-oriented cultural traditions were most pronounced and in which women's labor market participation was least, these relationships are now wholly reversed,' wrote the political scientist Francis G. Castles."
I appreciated Goldberg's sensitivity to cultural issues such as female genital mutilation. While she has a pro-feminist, pro-choice, anti-oppression bias - which I share - she captures multiple sides of arguments to give voice to various people of color, whose perspectives often get erased. I only lower my rating because I found parts of the book dry, such that they read like a series of facts as opposed to anything with more voice or style. Still, I found The Means of Reproduction a worthwhile read for anyone interested in global women's reproductive health. I will end this review with a quote from the final section of the book that captures Goldberg's overall thesis:
"But the oppression of women doesn't create order; it creates profound social deformities. It is universal the way violence is universal; both are atavisms that successful societies must contain and transcend. Liberty, ultimately, is something women in every society will have to win for themselves. It cannot be bequeathed by donors or mandated by treaties of courts. It can, however, be either supported or thwarted by international forces, which is why we all share some responsibility, some stake. Women's rights alone will not solve our massive problems, but none of them can be solved unless women are free."
A fascinating, in-depth examination of women's reproductive rights from an international perspective over the past 50 or 60 years. Michelle Goldberg shares the economic, health, and demographic consequences of countries and policies that prevent women from having control over their own bodies. Exploring Africa, Asia, Europe, and more, she connects the overarching oppression of women to the daily feelings and struggles of individual women worldwide. Goldberg addresses how complex issues like population control and feminist movements interact in unique, context-specific ways. On a personal note, reading this book made me even more mad at America's religious conservatives who blockade women's access to abortion overseas; our country's imperialism often causes so much harm. One quote about childbearing and liberation I liked:
"There is abundant evidence that if you want women in modern economies to have more babies, you need to help them reconcile work and childbearing, not encourage their subjection. In developing countries a lower status for women is associated with higher fertility, but once societies become highly industrialized and women taste a certain amount of liberation, the opposite is true. 'Whereas previously the countries with the highest period fertility rates were those in which family-oriented cultural traditions were most pronounced and in which women's labor market participation was least, these relationships are now wholly reversed,' wrote the political scientist Francis G. Castles."
I appreciated Goldberg's sensitivity to cultural issues such as female genital mutilation. While she has a pro-feminist, pro-choice, anti-oppression bias - which I share - she captures multiple sides of arguments to give voice to various people of color, whose perspectives often get erased. I only lower my rating because I found parts of the book dry, such that they read like a series of facts as opposed to anything with more voice or style. Still, I found The Means of Reproduction a worthwhile read for anyone interested in global women's reproductive health. I will end this review with a quote from the final section of the book that captures Goldberg's overall thesis:
"But the oppression of women doesn't create order; it creates profound social deformities. It is universal the way violence is universal; both are atavisms that successful societies must contain and transcend. Liberty, ultimately, is something women in every society will have to win for themselves. It cannot be bequeathed by donors or mandated by treaties of courts. It can, however, be either supported or thwarted by international forces, which is why we all share some responsibility, some stake. Women's rights alone will not solve our massive problems, but none of them can be solved unless women are free."
November 5, 2012
Tired of hearing about the magic sperm rejecting powers of women's bodies? Want to smack people who simply say "she should keep her legs closed"?
Read this.
A few months ago, my local NPR hosted a radio program about proposed changes to PA's abortion law. These changes would've included a vagina ultrasound as well making the woman carry around a picture from said ultrasound. The woman on the NPR show pointed out that in countries where men control reproduction that abortion is not really an issue of debate, and it's not because abortion doesn't exist in those places.
Abortion is a complicted topic if only because of what everyone brings to the table. Both Pro-Choice and Pro-Life are valid points; however, taking about sperm killing powers of women's bodies during rape is not (and is what I have an issue with). Goldberg's look at the issue of reproduction covers abortion in terms of population control as well as the woman's right, but she also looks at other sorts of control over women and thier reproduction. It's a must read simply because it forces a closer look at the issue (like, more recently, NPR's Being program).
Read this.
A few months ago, my local NPR hosted a radio program about proposed changes to PA's abortion law. These changes would've included a vagina ultrasound as well making the woman carry around a picture from said ultrasound. The woman on the NPR show pointed out that in countries where men control reproduction that abortion is not really an issue of debate, and it's not because abortion doesn't exist in those places.
Abortion is a complicted topic if only because of what everyone brings to the table. Both Pro-Choice and Pro-Life are valid points; however, taking about sperm killing powers of women's bodies during rape is not (and is what I have an issue with). Goldberg's look at the issue of reproduction covers abortion in terms of population control as well as the woman's right, but she also looks at other sorts of control over women and thier reproduction. It's a must read simply because it forces a closer look at the issue (like, more recently, NPR's Being program).
September 12, 2014
This is a work of clunky and malicious propaganda. Anecdotes and misinformation are slapped together in a crass, manipulative pr style lamenting that Hitler and Sanjay Gandhi's "excesses" discredited eugenics. Under the flimsy veil of feminist concern for reproductive freedom, Goldberg launches a creepy white supremacist revival of eugenics mythology, bemoaning that there aren't enough "Europeans" but there are too many of everyone else. While the book purports to be a kind of history of "overpopulation" remedies, she never brings herself to say what's unsatisfactory about the population status quo; with snark alone she dismisses the consensus among social scientists regarding the anticommunist and imperialist motives for such programs and their crackpot Social Darwinist guiding philosophies. Goldberg defends Margaret Sanger's odious racism with childish vulgar historicism and at the same time seems to give credit to Sanger's absurd racial anthropology. From her own unjustified dogmatic position, she deploys this same racist paradigm to raise an alarm about Muslims conquering Europe by breeding populations of threatening Semitic aliens 'within their secular host societites.' Unsupported dogmatic statements are followed by streams of speculation and psychologistic fantasizing: John D Rockefeller III, we are told, was an "altruistic" man who funded the program that trained Mengele and founded the Population Council for selfless and laudable motives. Goldberg insists the 'modest' JD Rockefeller III was a man whose concerns that "Modern civilization has reduced natural selection,
saving more ‘weak’ lives and allowing them to reproduce," were prompted by "compassion" and whose project to reduce population growth among African-Americans, deemed "socially inadequate" by his organization, was admirable and benevolent. Goldberg insinuates that African Americans resisting these contraception and sterilization drives were mad, unenlightened and misguided militants. (The proof Goldberg offers of this "fact" of Rockefeller's benevolence, altruism and "feminism" is that an employee of his said he used to say he preferred to talk to the wives of politicians when dining at events.) Goldberg's final chapter "the Birth Strike" replicates all the nauseous phantasmagoric Islamophobic propaganda of Europe's extreme right, repeating the complaints expressed in the manifesto of the fascist mass murderer Andras Behring Breivik who slaughtered dozens of Norwegian students at a labour party summer camp for the declared purpose of terrorizing Norwegians into a white supremacist immigration policy. Like Goldberg, Breivik fretted in his manifesto that Europe was being destroyed from within by Muslim immigrants who took advantage of the sissified and weakened male that feminism had created in Europe. Goldberg shares Breivik's obsession with one Mullah Krekar, quoted by Breivik repeatedly and centrally staged by Goldberg in her depiction of the Muslim demographic menace posing a threat to "European values" (feminism, gay rights) and European standard of living (by, she suggests without a shred of evidence, reluctance to pay taxes to support their welfare states). While admitting that the "conservative" analysis that appear as Breivik's rationale for murdering socialist Norwegian schoolchildren is "exaggerated", Goldberg stresses it is "not wrong." It's truly a disgusting performance, a wonky, genteel, euphemistic rehashing of Sanger's hideous exterminationist Pivot of Civilization, mixed with Malthus, Laughlin, the Ehrlichs, and a splash of Hitler.
For a sane alternative on the topics this lunatic, unresearched and repulsive book treats, see _The Republic of Hunger and other essays_ by Utsa Patnaik, _The Crisis of Multiculturalism_ by Lentin and Titley, on these themes of the demographic Muslim intruder threat of "Eurabia" that Goldberg recycles, _the Myth of Population Control__, by Mahmood Mamdani (husband of director Mira Nair) and _the Legacy of Malthus_ by Allan Chase.
saving more ‘weak’ lives and allowing them to reproduce," were prompted by "compassion" and whose project to reduce population growth among African-Americans, deemed "socially inadequate" by his organization, was admirable and benevolent. Goldberg insinuates that African Americans resisting these contraception and sterilization drives were mad, unenlightened and misguided militants. (The proof Goldberg offers of this "fact" of Rockefeller's benevolence, altruism and "feminism" is that an employee of his said he used to say he preferred to talk to the wives of politicians when dining at events.) Goldberg's final chapter "the Birth Strike" replicates all the nauseous phantasmagoric Islamophobic propaganda of Europe's extreme right, repeating the complaints expressed in the manifesto of the fascist mass murderer Andras Behring Breivik who slaughtered dozens of Norwegian students at a labour party summer camp for the declared purpose of terrorizing Norwegians into a white supremacist immigration policy. Like Goldberg, Breivik fretted in his manifesto that Europe was being destroyed from within by Muslim immigrants who took advantage of the sissified and weakened male that feminism had created in Europe. Goldberg shares Breivik's obsession with one Mullah Krekar, quoted by Breivik repeatedly and centrally staged by Goldberg in her depiction of the Muslim demographic menace posing a threat to "European values" (feminism, gay rights) and European standard of living (by, she suggests without a shred of evidence, reluctance to pay taxes to support their welfare states). While admitting that the "conservative" analysis that appear as Breivik's rationale for murdering socialist Norwegian schoolchildren is "exaggerated", Goldberg stresses it is "not wrong." It's truly a disgusting performance, a wonky, genteel, euphemistic rehashing of Sanger's hideous exterminationist Pivot of Civilization, mixed with Malthus, Laughlin, the Ehrlichs, and a splash of Hitler.
For a sane alternative on the topics this lunatic, unresearched and repulsive book treats, see _The Republic of Hunger and other essays_ by Utsa Patnaik, _The Crisis of Multiculturalism_ by Lentin and Titley, on these themes of the demographic Muslim intruder threat of "Eurabia" that Goldberg recycles, _the Myth of Population Control__, by Mahmood Mamdani (husband of director Mira Nair) and _the Legacy of Malthus_ by Allan Chase.
June 5, 2011
Goldberg's book is an overview of the international battle over women's reproductive rights throughout the last 50-60 years.
The author clearly has a bias on this issue. She clearly thinks that reproductive rights and family planning are good and necessary. She is clearly pro-choice, pro-birth control, and anti-oppression. I happen to agree with her. However, I greatly admired that, despite her bias, she always included the arguments and reasonings of the people on the other side of the fence. I felt that she did so without condescension or judgment. I think that this is so important in the dialogue about such hot button topics. Personally, I'm tired of the "'I disagree with you,' 'Well, if you disagree with me, you're a poopy face'" rhetoric that seems to have taken over the U.S. national stage in the last 20-30 years. It's refreshing to read reasoned arguments.
For example, I admired Goldberg's restraint in her chapter about female circumcision. This is a topic that I can barely even stand to think about. I could hardly even read the chapter. The thought of these procedures being done to young girls makes me sick to my stomach and furious. But I am grateful to Goldberg for including an even-toned explanation of why ANY woman would be for such procedures. I have never understood it before. I still disagree, but it's the first time that I've understood where such women are even coming from.
But I digress. Overall, I found this book very interesting. It can be a little dry in parts, but I still found it fascinating to learn how the issue of reproductive rights even got started and found its way onto the international stage (pressure from the U.S., perhaps unsurprisingly). It was even more fascinating to learn about the mistakes the early movement made, which sowed a lot of the seeds that started the backlash against it. It was appalling to learn how much power the U.S. has in shaping the future of these issues in the world. And it was particularly interesting to learn a little bit about how these issues are viewed/handled in the rest of the world. The chapter on India's rampant problem with gender-specific abortions was riveting!
I would hope that this book would be a tough read for anyone - the tendency throughout the world of societies to oppress women as a means to control scary cultural changes should depress/frighten any person, or at the very least any female. But I think that the book is a valuable read for anyone looking to understand these issues.
The author clearly has a bias on this issue. She clearly thinks that reproductive rights and family planning are good and necessary. She is clearly pro-choice, pro-birth control, and anti-oppression. I happen to agree with her. However, I greatly admired that, despite her bias, she always included the arguments and reasonings of the people on the other side of the fence. I felt that she did so without condescension or judgment. I think that this is so important in the dialogue about such hot button topics. Personally, I'm tired of the "'I disagree with you,' 'Well, if you disagree with me, you're a poopy face'" rhetoric that seems to have taken over the U.S. national stage in the last 20-30 years. It's refreshing to read reasoned arguments.
For example, I admired Goldberg's restraint in her chapter about female circumcision. This is a topic that I can barely even stand to think about. I could hardly even read the chapter. The thought of these procedures being done to young girls makes me sick to my stomach and furious. But I am grateful to Goldberg for including an even-toned explanation of why ANY woman would be for such procedures. I have never understood it before. I still disagree, but it's the first time that I've understood where such women are even coming from.
But I digress. Overall, I found this book very interesting. It can be a little dry in parts, but I still found it fascinating to learn how the issue of reproductive rights even got started and found its way onto the international stage (pressure from the U.S., perhaps unsurprisingly). It was even more fascinating to learn about the mistakes the early movement made, which sowed a lot of the seeds that started the backlash against it. It was appalling to learn how much power the U.S. has in shaping the future of these issues in the world. And it was particularly interesting to learn a little bit about how these issues are viewed/handled in the rest of the world. The chapter on India's rampant problem with gender-specific abortions was riveting!
I would hope that this book would be a tough read for anyone - the tendency throughout the world of societies to oppress women as a means to control scary cultural changes should depress/frighten any person, or at the very least any female. But I think that the book is a valuable read for anyone looking to understand these issues.
March 27, 2010
A good companion piece to Half the Sky, I dog-eared so many pages that I had to stop before the entire right corner of the book was folded down. I suppose I had some idea about a lot of the ground it covers, but never to the point where it really hit home exactly what is at stake.
It starts out with the infuriating consequences that crop up when abortion is criminalized. The fact that women have died of ectopic pregnancies and incomplete miscarriages because doctors can't intervene before the fetus is technically dead is pretty sickening. In El Salvador, women coming in with miscarriages are reported to the attorney general for investigation. The whole idea of "uterus as crime scene" is pretty abhorrent to me though I guess Utah likes it. I don't understand the mindset behind forcing a 9-year-old to carry an incestuous rape pregnancy.
From there the book moves on to attempts to rein in a possible overpopulation crisis worldwide. While it seems to be a noble goal that will give women a chance to control over their fertility, the people planning this seem to have cut the women themselves out of the equation hoping that the mere presence of contraception and abortion services would do the trick. I didn't know that at one point the Catholic church came close to reversing their long stance against contraception (apparently it is "intrinsically evil" which is a label not even applied to murder) but Pius XI issued Casti Connubii which pretty much concluded that since contraception had always been a no-no, it should stay that way otherwise the papacy might be seen as fallible.
After that it's a continuation of an international movement in women's rights and the US's about-face where it tries to undo all of the good it did by disseminating information and resources towards women's health, backpedaling furiously in order to placate the newly minted Christian conservative movement and leaving a lot of dead women in its wake. Then there's a chapter on female circumcision and all of the attendant horrors that accompany it.
Then comes the aftermath of population control where technology gets ahead of cultural enlightenment. With a more expedient way to check for female fetuses, most Indian castes used the advent of the ultrasound to weed out the unwanted girls to make room for boys in their two children households thus leading to wildly skewed sex ratios. The huge economic cost of girls through their dowries means that they can be treated terribly, assuming they're allowed to be born at all. Only by raising the status of women above chattel will girl children be valued enough to stop culling them so wantonly. India and China will likely face some pretty rough unrest as a result of the gender imbalance. It's scary to think of how it will all play out.
This book does a good job of covering the bases of what happens when women are second-class citizens who don't control their own bodies. As with most other books on the same topic, the conclusion is that women have the power to save the world but only if they (we) have equal rights.
It starts out with the infuriating consequences that crop up when abortion is criminalized. The fact that women have died of ectopic pregnancies and incomplete miscarriages because doctors can't intervene before the fetus is technically dead is pretty sickening. In El Salvador, women coming in with miscarriages are reported to the attorney general for investigation. The whole idea of "uterus as crime scene" is pretty abhorrent to me though I guess Utah likes it. I don't understand the mindset behind forcing a 9-year-old to carry an incestuous rape pregnancy.
From there the book moves on to attempts to rein in a possible overpopulation crisis worldwide. While it seems to be a noble goal that will give women a chance to control over their fertility, the people planning this seem to have cut the women themselves out of the equation hoping that the mere presence of contraception and abortion services would do the trick. I didn't know that at one point the Catholic church came close to reversing their long stance against contraception (apparently it is "intrinsically evil" which is a label not even applied to murder) but Pius XI issued Casti Connubii which pretty much concluded that since contraception had always been a no-no, it should stay that way otherwise the papacy might be seen as fallible.
After that it's a continuation of an international movement in women's rights and the US's about-face where it tries to undo all of the good it did by disseminating information and resources towards women's health, backpedaling furiously in order to placate the newly minted Christian conservative movement and leaving a lot of dead women in its wake. Then there's a chapter on female circumcision and all of the attendant horrors that accompany it.
Then comes the aftermath of population control where technology gets ahead of cultural enlightenment. With a more expedient way to check for female fetuses, most Indian castes used the advent of the ultrasound to weed out the unwanted girls to make room for boys in their two children households thus leading to wildly skewed sex ratios. The huge economic cost of girls through their dowries means that they can be treated terribly, assuming they're allowed to be born at all. Only by raising the status of women above chattel will girl children be valued enough to stop culling them so wantonly. India and China will likely face some pretty rough unrest as a result of the gender imbalance. It's scary to think of how it will all play out.
This book does a good job of covering the bases of what happens when women are second-class citizens who don't control their own bodies. As with most other books on the same topic, the conclusion is that women have the power to save the world but only if they (we) have equal rights.
January 26, 2019
The book is a work of journalism, but Goldberg is on board with the decriminalize-abortion attitude expressed by Norway's prime minister:
Goldberg shows us some of the horrors of banning all abortion: botched illegal abortions, doctors forced to wait 'til fallopian tube bursts when embryo grows there, 9-year-old raped by stepfather forced to bear child. Goldberg gives us some of the scope of the problem: 42 million abortions per year worldwide, 20 million of them unsafe. [p. 3]
The Western embrace of birth control is largely to limit population. Seven billion now, adding a billion every 12 years, have already caused extinction of half the plant and animal species that existed less than a lifetime ago. Human-caused biosphere warming gives storms, floods, droughts, ocean acidification and dieoffs.
goodreads.com/book/show/17910054-the-...
Official alarm at high and rising population, and especially fear of revolting peasants, led to a focus on birth control at the expense of concern for peoples' well-being and wishes. India in the 1980s forced many poor men to have vasectomies. China's one-child policy led to widespread female infanticide. And the United Nations Population Fund gave the Indian and Chinese leaders /awards/ for this! [pp. 82-83, 100]
People have come to understand that even if all you care about is reducing births, especially of /those/ people, the way is to empower women, not take away their option of motherhood but provide opportunity for a meaningful life in other ways too.
The United Nations is mostly on board with the women's-rights-are-human-rights idea
goodreads.com/book/show/26173970-wome...
thanks to activism by women in recent decades.
Abortion bans are largely relics of colonialism: part of the colonizers' patriarchal control of women at home, a mindset exported to the colonies. [p. 41]
The book is available mainly just at university libraries.
worldcat.org/title/means-of-reproduct...
Library of Congress call number:
HQ
766.5
D44
G65
2009
234 pages plus end matter.
Quiz question:
goodreads.com/trivia/work/6172179-the...
“Morality becomes hypocrisy if it means accepting mothers' suffering or dying in connection with unwanted pregnancies and illegal abortions, and unwanted children living in misery.” [Norwegian Prime Minister, speech at 1994 UN International Conference on Population and Development, Cairo. Quoted in The Means of Reproduction: Sex, Power, and the Future of the World, Michelle Goldberg 2009, pp. 103-104]
goodreads.com/quotes/9652079-morality...
Goldberg shows us some of the horrors of banning all abortion: botched illegal abortions, doctors forced to wait 'til fallopian tube bursts when embryo grows there, 9-year-old raped by stepfather forced to bear child. Goldberg gives us some of the scope of the problem: 42 million abortions per year worldwide, 20 million of them unsafe. [p. 3]
The Western embrace of birth control is largely to limit population. Seven billion now, adding a billion every 12 years, have already caused extinction of half the plant and animal species that existed less than a lifetime ago. Human-caused biosphere warming gives storms, floods, droughts, ocean acidification and dieoffs.
goodreads.com/book/show/17910054-the-...
Official alarm at high and rising population, and especially fear of revolting peasants, led to a focus on birth control at the expense of concern for peoples' well-being and wishes. India in the 1980s forced many poor men to have vasectomies. China's one-child policy led to widespread female infanticide. And the United Nations Population Fund gave the Indian and Chinese leaders /awards/ for this! [pp. 82-83, 100]
People have come to understand that even if all you care about is reducing births, especially of /those/ people, the way is to empower women, not take away their option of motherhood but provide opportunity for a meaningful life in other ways too.
The United Nations is mostly on board with the women's-rights-are-human-rights idea
goodreads.com/book/show/26173970-wome...
thanks to activism by women in recent decades.
Abortion bans are largely relics of colonialism: part of the colonizers' patriarchal control of women at home, a mindset exported to the colonies. [p. 41]
The book is available mainly just at university libraries.
worldcat.org/title/means-of-reproduct...
Library of Congress call number:
HQ
766.5
D44
G65
2009
234 pages plus end matter.
Quiz question:
goodreads.com/trivia/work/6172179-the...
June 19, 2009
A very interesting, though somewhat irritating, look at the history of reproductive rights for women over the past 50-60 years. It's extremely well researched, and irritating only in that Goldberg introduces us to scholars and NGO workers and then, many pages later, refers to them by last name only (with no context). I finally gave up trying to remember who was who.
The book concludes with some very powerful statements. "In a perfect world, the prospect of Malthusian doom would not be required to make international institutions take women's needs seriously. Still, it is heartening to see so many areas where the interests of feminists, environmentalists, economists, and development bureaucrats overlap. They coincide because there is no force for good on the planet as powerful as the liberation of women."
And, the final sentence, "Women's rights alone will not solve our massive problems, but none of them can be solved unless women are free."
The book concludes with some very powerful statements. "In a perfect world, the prospect of Malthusian doom would not be required to make international institutions take women's needs seriously. Still, it is heartening to see so many areas where the interests of feminists, environmentalists, economists, and development bureaucrats overlap. They coincide because there is no force for good on the planet as powerful as the liberation of women."
And, the final sentence, "Women's rights alone will not solve our massive problems, but none of them can be solved unless women are free."
June 30, 2013
The best book on global reproductive freedom I have ever read. The author does a great job of explaining the fissures between the population control movement and those who want to empower women to make the best reproductive decisions that they can for themselves. This book truly helped me to realize for the first time that rather than an East-West split on human rights issues, there are civilizing and savage forces in all societies and that those who care about human rights must be the allies of people everywhere who seek human autonomy and the adversary of those everywhere who seek its opposite. Highly recommended.
August 21, 2012
A first rate book covering the population crisis, women, sex, and reproduction from the 1960's to the present. Reporting from around the world - North, Central and South America, Africa, Asia, Europe. Topics covered include birth control, abortion, sterilization, female "circumcision", women's rights etc etc. Chronologically Goldberg reports from the 1960's to the 2000's - the involvement of the US and the UN; the politics and the changing social conversation within the US and around the world. She covers the HIV-AIDS crisis, which is especially devastating among women in Africa. And a chapter on "missing girls" in Asia and even among immigrants from Asia living in the US and Canada.
I'm pretty familiar with the topic having studied Population Planning, as the department was called, at the U of Michigan School of Public Health in the late 1960's and then perinatal epidemiology at Columbia U in the 1980's. Nonetheless, I learned a lot and got to know some of the internal politics and personnel relationships in some of the big institutional actors - USAID, Ford Foundation, Population Council, Planned Parenthood in the US and internationally.
I'm pretty familiar with the topic having studied Population Planning, as the department was called, at the U of Michigan School of Public Health in the late 1960's and then perinatal epidemiology at Columbia U in the 1980's. Nonetheless, I learned a lot and got to know some of the internal politics and personnel relationships in some of the big institutional actors - USAID, Ford Foundation, Population Council, Planned Parenthood in the US and internationally.
November 1, 2012
This global bird's-eye overview of the reproductive health and rights movement manages to cover a lot of ground while still making sense of seemingly disparate women's rights issues such as resurgent abortion criminalization movements with female genital cutting (the secret ingredient is patriarchy!). I especially appreciated Goldberg's insight into the early population-control movement and how unsung feminist heroes like Adrienne Germaine and Joan Dunlop helped morph it from its coercive, paternalistic origins into a rights-minded movement. In public health we still continue to struggle with the dilemma of being neocolonialist versus simply ignoring the world's problems, and books like this can help bring some nuance to the table.
April 9, 2019
The book was informative and well-written in my opinion. The book mainly deals with the necessity of women needing the power to choose.
Goldberg has traced the history of reproductive rights and the fight for it pretty eloquently. She has tackled the history of abortion laws, the customs/rites regarding females across continents and a lot of real world examples of people who have worked for the rights.
Goldberg has traced the history of reproductive rights and the fight for it pretty eloquently. She has tackled the history of abortion laws, the customs/rites regarding females across continents and a lot of real world examples of people who have worked for the rights.
April 3, 2018
A must read for anyone working on reproductive health and family planning!
April 9, 2015
Goldberg’s survey of women’s power and rights in the modern era is fascinating and engaging, with a wide variety of subtopics and focuses that keep the pace moving and give readers of many interests something to dig their teeth into. The horrifying first chapter zeroes in on abortion politics in Nicaragua; the case of Rosa, a very young girl who was impregnated secretly by her stepfather and who the authorities denied an abortion, introduces the role of the Vatican in shaping regressive policies around the globe. The next few chapters chronicle the intertwining rises of population politics and global women’s liberation. The highlight of these sections is Goldberg’s analysis of the Vatican’s alliance with regressive regimes around the world, including totalitarian Muslim countries in the Middle East and Africa, to fight against the global expansion of women’s rights. The close of the book was the strongest; she tackles the tough subject of sex-selective abortions and population growth (more accurately decline, I suppose) rates in industrialized countries. She makes a convincing case that despite these problems coinciding with the rise of contraception and abortion access in the world, the actual cause is still backwards views of the proper role of women in a society, and that countries which actually value motherhood and parenting instead of just demanding it (such as Sweden and France) see the modern perspective as one of growth and health instead of decline and sickness. The book is very interesting, with no chapters that I didn’t find worth the read, though its depth is understandably lacking in several areas given its broad scope. One final note: although the title suggests a Marxist perspective on issue of reproductive rights, the text itself seemed much more mainstream liberal than that. This isn’t a pro or a con to me, just an observation.
January 30, 2017
This book tells the story of reproductive rights from the 1950's to now. The author tells the story from both the high perspective of the UN and international activists and stories from on the ground how reproductive rights actually look like in a country. Goldberg shows how the spread of reproductive rights began with efforts to control population, became explicitly pro-woman and how conservatives caused a backlash against reproductive rights.
The author makes a persuasive case arguing that increasing women's rights, good in it's own right, also is effective at controlling population growth, preventing spread of STI's and reducing barbaric practices like FGM. Goldberg also tries to make the case that in developed countries more pro-women policies (specifically paid maternity leave, easy access to day care, and parental stipends) would create a higher birthrate (which many desire for political though arguably racist reasons). The case here is on shakier ground and she admits as much, but it is an important message nonetheless.
Overall this book is amazing for its materialist, demographic and feminist bent. Many books can give you the history of women's movements and the arguments for women's equality. Goldberg's work is remarkable because it also gives a history of the material and demographic changes wrought by women's increasing equality (and by the changes wrought by the backlash against women's equality). This history is important in itself but Goldberg even goes a step further. She explains why this history demonstrates the material need for women's equality on a changing planet (and how it can help women's movements gain allies who may have less worthy objectives).
The author makes a persuasive case arguing that increasing women's rights, good in it's own right, also is effective at controlling population growth, preventing spread of STI's and reducing barbaric practices like FGM. Goldberg also tries to make the case that in developed countries more pro-women policies (specifically paid maternity leave, easy access to day care, and parental stipends) would create a higher birthrate (which many desire for political though arguably racist reasons). The case here is on shakier ground and she admits as much, but it is an important message nonetheless.
Overall this book is amazing for its materialist, demographic and feminist bent. Many books can give you the history of women's movements and the arguments for women's equality. Goldberg's work is remarkable because it also gives a history of the material and demographic changes wrought by women's increasing equality (and by the changes wrought by the backlash against women's equality). This history is important in itself but Goldberg even goes a step further. She explains why this history demonstrates the material need for women's equality on a changing planet (and how it can help women's movements gain allies who may have less worthy objectives).
March 3, 2009
Disclosure: Michelle Goldberg and I both have the same literary agent; I write this of my own enthusiasm for the book Goldberg has produced. This is a must read for anyone concerned about global stability or human progress. The Means of Reproduction takes a tough and fascinating look at the global struggle to advance women's reproductive rights and the countervailing movement to restrict them. I've often found the jargon and clinical language of the global reproductive rights movement bewildering, and I speak as someone who spent a year working as a writer for an organization that plays an important role in that world. Goldberg translates the code into a terribly alive narrative of a never-fulfilled movement to achieve reproductive freedom for women. Yet the book also acknowledges, with great skill and sensitivity, that well-meaning efforts from within the movement to set limits on reproductive and bodily rights ultimately undermine the very cause of self-determinaton and equality they seek to promote, and her book comes to the difficult but necessary conclusion that within every society and code of law women must be free to make their own decisions.
The U.S. has played both sides of this epic tug-of-war, and under the Obama administration will undoubtedly jump back on the team for reproductive rights. But as this book's journeys to India, Africa, and Latin America suggest, that project now needs to move forward to a whole other level - to concern itself, ultimately, with advancing women's freedom. Great combo of fresh from-the-scene reporting and thoughtful, provocative analysis.
The U.S. has played both sides of this epic tug-of-war, and under the Obama administration will undoubtedly jump back on the team for reproductive rights. But as this book's journeys to India, Africa, and Latin America suggest, that project now needs to move forward to a whole other level - to concern itself, ultimately, with advancing women's freedom. Great combo of fresh from-the-scene reporting and thoughtful, provocative analysis.
May 24, 2009
Like a lot of what I read, I heard about this one from an interview of the author on NPR. The thing that caught my ear was the mention of a woman who had willingly undergone female genital mutilation (FGM) as an adult, part of her full acceptance of into her ancestral Sierra Leonean tribe, despite having been born and raised in the United States.
Back in college, I did a major report on FGM and have been fascinated by the practice ever since. I was 17 and had never known much outside my WASP-y hometown. A friend losing her virginity was shocking news to me at that time (it still is, to be honest), and reading first-hand accounts of FGM was enough to make me cross my legs and try not to pass out.
In any case, The Means of Reproduction is a very interesting book. Goldman writes like someone who has been there, who has seen everything she describes with her own eyes. She makes no attempt to veil or even couch her feminist perspective. In addition to a look at FGM in Africa (which she weighs as both a brutal, anti-feminist practice and a lingering link to a world being phased out by neocolonialism - the opinion shared by the aforementioned Sierra Leone woman), Goldman also explores abortion around the world and the available of contraceptive methods, both of which have been alternately supported and denounced by the United States.
This book did little to alter my budding feminism, which I derive, interestingly, from my Christian faith; but, it was a very readable and engaging exploration of the interrelated nature of women's rights and the well-being of world as a whole. All in all, a good read and one I recommend to feminists and non-feminists alike.
Back in college, I did a major report on FGM and have been fascinated by the practice ever since. I was 17 and had never known much outside my WASP-y hometown. A friend losing her virginity was shocking news to me at that time (it still is, to be honest), and reading first-hand accounts of FGM was enough to make me cross my legs and try not to pass out.
In any case, The Means of Reproduction is a very interesting book. Goldman writes like someone who has been there, who has seen everything she describes with her own eyes. She makes no attempt to veil or even couch her feminist perspective. In addition to a look at FGM in Africa (which she weighs as both a brutal, anti-feminist practice and a lingering link to a world being phased out by neocolonialism - the opinion shared by the aforementioned Sierra Leone woman), Goldman also explores abortion around the world and the available of contraceptive methods, both of which have been alternately supported and denounced by the United States.
This book did little to alter my budding feminism, which I derive, interestingly, from my Christian faith; but, it was a very readable and engaging exploration of the interrelated nature of women's rights and the well-being of world as a whole. All in all, a good read and one I recommend to feminists and non-feminists alike.
March 21, 2015
Overall The Means of Reproduction is well-written and informative. I think the opening chapter was jammed pack with information and expected you to have background information on South American issues that not many people are likely to have. This made the book have a shaky beginning for me and I worried that the entire book would be an attempt to jam as much information as possible into the pages, readability be damned. However, after this shaky beginning I found the topics and historical connections to issues more concise and readable. The topics vary but always come down to women's rights and how reproductive rights greatly impact the world as a whole. This is probably the first book of any kind I've read where the topic of female genital mutilation was actually discussed in-depth, with both sides of the issue portrayed. This is probably the most difficult chapter to get through but I think it was an important one. It is also difficult to swallow the fact the U.S. politics continue to impact world reproductive rights and health. Republicans being in the White House should not suddenly mean a woman halfway around the world will now die or suffer because she cannot have proper access to healthcare, including abortion. It is really appalling.
The Means of Reproduction is an important read but prepare for frustration.
The Means of Reproduction is an important read but prepare for frustration.
April 17, 2018
A comprehensive look at the global population movement, and how its success is intimately entwined with gender equality efforts. Starting in the 50's, it follows the population movement through it's early days, informed by a fear of overpopulation, communism and demography shift, through it's growth into feminism-based support for women's liberation around the globe.
The coverage of contraception, abortion, FGM and female infanticide/feticide (largely in Asia) was excellent. The author really emphasized the fact that the empowerment of women is necessary for all of the goals of population, and how it's lack (such as in areas that highly utilize sex-specific fetal termination) leads directly to some of the most pressing issues for the global community (such as countries with large populations of young, single men and all the attendant violence that accompanies that demographic shift).
I'm so glad that she also covered birth rate decline in developed nations. So many would shy away from that topic because of the uncomfortable truths that need to be addressed, but low birthrates are still a symptom of oppression and should be discussed even though they largely affect relatively wealthy and liberalized nations.
The coverage of contraception, abortion, FGM and female infanticide/feticide (largely in Asia) was excellent. The author really emphasized the fact that the empowerment of women is necessary for all of the goals of population, and how it's lack (such as in areas that highly utilize sex-specific fetal termination) leads directly to some of the most pressing issues for the global community (such as countries with large populations of young, single men and all the attendant violence that accompanies that demographic shift).
I'm so glad that she also covered birth rate decline in developed nations. So many would shy away from that topic because of the uncomfortable truths that need to be addressed, but low birthrates are still a symptom of oppression and should be discussed even though they largely affect relatively wealthy and liberalized nations.
December 30, 2011
An excellent tour of the many, many factors that play into the global evolution of reproductive rights as women's rights as human rights. The author goes beyond the ubiquitous abortion-versus-religion to explore everything from the motives and ramifications of government population policies that try to both increase and decrease fertility rates, to FGM, to imbalanced sex ratios, to the Vatican's token role in the UN that would be absurd if it weren't so effective.
Throughout, Goldberg maintains an even tone while discussing both sides of charged issues, despite her own clear liberal views. This at times made passages difficult to read, given the deeply emotional topics covered, but I appreciated her efforts to present both sides of complicated questions and felt the book was more enlightening for this challenge.
Throughout, Goldberg maintains an even tone while discussing both sides of charged issues, despite her own clear liberal views. This at times made passages difficult to read, given the deeply emotional topics covered, but I appreciated her efforts to present both sides of complicated questions and felt the book was more enlightening for this challenge.
July 21, 2011
A complex subject because of the varied facets of historical subjugation of women and womanhood. This is not just a book about abortion rights,pro or con, in fact it often goes beyond the typical liberal thinking of sexual equality, not that the typical conservative thought will be happy with this work either; to talk of sexual equality is to talk of children and family as well as individual women; in fact in M. Goldberg’s treatise, it is to address these rights not as an adjunct to the great themes of poverty, war, and peace, but to show their integral connection to so much in the human race. The politics of religion as well as the politics of fear and resistance in how women’s roles have been “decided” are quite convincing. The notes and references are extensive.
September 13, 2009
This is a copy of someone else's review, but I had to use it becase it says exactly what I wish I could put into an intelligent review.
"This was a book that I might refer to as a vegetable of nonfiction—a healthy book to have read, but often hard to get through due to the dry prose style. Goldberg writes about a variety of issues that relate to women’s health—abortion, population control, etc.—and describes how culture wars between the East and the West, the First and Third World, and, in some cases, liberals and conservatives are undermining women’s autonomy and therefore, often, the social fabric of society."
"This was a book that I might refer to as a vegetable of nonfiction—a healthy book to have read, but often hard to get through due to the dry prose style. Goldberg writes about a variety of issues that relate to women’s health—abortion, population control, etc.—and describes how culture wars between the East and the West, the First and Third World, and, in some cases, liberals and conservatives are undermining women’s autonomy and therefore, often, the social fabric of society."
June 4, 2009
Read a library copy - I need to buy this so I'll have the fascinating statistics close at hand. Goldberg does an excellent job of exploring the global movement of population control. She zeroes in on several important aspects, from the early days of the UN and USAID's work on family planning in developing countries, to unbalanced sex ratios in India. Interviews with people on all sides of an issue keep the material engaging. The "deceptively simple" conclusion - empowering women with education, equal rights, and autonomy is key to the future of our planet - is supported again and again throughout the book. Highly recommended.
September 16, 2010
Non-fiction book by Michelle Goldberg about the history and current situation of women's rights, especially reproductive rights, around the globe.
All around good and informative and at times depressing read. Sheesh, what's wrong with you, world? It's sickening how many decisions about women's lives are still made by men. Both inside families and in governments, NGOs and whoever else feels they should chime in. Not that I was surprised.
It's a good read, the style is accessible and the amount of information in these pages is enormous. It took me forever to finish it since I somehow misplaced it down the road and then had a hard time getting back into it, which really is a shame.
All around good and informative and at times depressing read. Sheesh, what's wrong with you, world? It's sickening how many decisions about women's lives are still made by men. Both inside families and in governments, NGOs and whoever else feels they should chime in. Not that I was surprised.
It's a good read, the style is accessible and the amount of information in these pages is enormous. It took me forever to finish it since I somehow misplaced it down the road and then had a hard time getting back into it, which really is a shame.
June 1, 2012
This book covers reproductive rights throughout the world and covers very, very complicated issues related to it: the problems of population growth/decline, how women and their sexuality are viewed in different societies, education, and women as financial burdens (in India, girls are not as desirable because their parents must pay increasingly expensive dowries to the groom's family when their daughters marry). It was interesting to see how all of these different issues affected ideas about reproduction. I thought the first half of the book moved along pretty well, but the rest of it seemed disorganized and was harder for me to get through.
February 21, 2009
The Means of Reproduction is a bold and vital book, a story about life and those who twist that word to front for agendas of sexual control around the world. We're lucky that we have Michelle Goldberg, a brilliant and clear-eyed journalist, to bring us news of how the struggle over reproductive rights has gone global, as the American Right teams up with reactionary forces abroad. Goldberg calls it one of the most important fights of our time; after you read The Means of Reproduction, you will, too.
August 28, 2009
I read this book for the Womens Way book prize award that will be selected this fall and could not recommend it more.
This book does an excellent job of presented a LOT of information but making it extremely accessible to the reader. Goldberg takes us around the world, looking at family planning and reproduction policy and how it affects both women's health and reproductive issues, but also the balance of power and the economic development of those countries. She goes to great lengths to find alternate view points and present them in a fair way.
Well worth the read!
This book does an excellent job of presented a LOT of information but making it extremely accessible to the reader. Goldberg takes us around the world, looking at family planning and reproduction policy and how it affects both women's health and reproductive issues, but also the balance of power and the economic development of those countries. She goes to great lengths to find alternate view points and present them in a fair way.
Well worth the read!
May 12, 2010
This is a masterful piece of investigative journalism that outlines challenges past, present, and future to feminists around the globe. At times frustrating and heartbreaking, I've yet to read another author who looks at real issues on the ground from as many different angles as possible before coming to a simple and resounding conclusion: the reproductive autonomy of women needs to be a central component to any actions aimed at solving the multitude of demographic and environmental problems facing the globe.
September 22, 2016
Michelle Goldberg's history of the family planning in the U.S. (and, by extension, globally) is thorough, well-researched, and presented in a way that is accessible and interesting given the somewhat dry nature of aspects of the topic.
She does an excellent job of interweaving related areas of discourse (e.g. the intersection between over- and under-population concerns, women's rights, and family planning/abortion policies).
For anyone broadly interested in feminism, gender equality, reproductive justice, and/or population, this is an excellent choice.
She does an excellent job of interweaving related areas of discourse (e.g. the intersection between over- and under-population concerns, women's rights, and family planning/abortion policies).
For anyone broadly interested in feminism, gender equality, reproductive justice, and/or population, this is an excellent choice.
April 1, 2016
Cohesive, well researched and historical look at the modern international reproductive movements at their various political and philosophical stages. It examines the complexities of different international and local involvement (including NGOs, different religious and feminist organizations) in the various aspects of reproductive healthcare and centers the impact these policies had/have on women's access to reproductive care and childbearing realities.
July 10, 2009
This is not an abortion debate book. This book is about the history of reproductive rights around the world and the problems that began it and the problems that resulted. This is a book about who controls the right to decide reproductive rights around the world.
I found the book to be well-written and utterly fascinating. I highly recommend it to anyone willing to read it.
I found the book to be well-written and utterly fascinating. I highly recommend it to anyone willing to read it.
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