08.12.2020 Claudia Snochowska-Gonzalez (Polish Academy of Sciences Warsaw)

The Struggle for Liberalization of Abortion Law in Poland and Spain: Its Context, Effects, and Prospects for the Future

Dienstag, 08.12.2020, 18 Uhr c.t., digital über Zoom

The recent attempts to tighten the already restrictive abortion law in Poland were met with strong resistance. My presentation will address various forms of action proposed by the newly established collective women's* subject: abortion self-help, quasi-guerilla activities, solidarity campaigns - all conducted in the name of radical empathy and mutual aid and at the same time counterbalancing the fascist tendencies in Polish public life. I will refer to the results of the study conducted with Jennifer Ramme (European University Viadrina, Frankfurt Oder), in which we focused on the "ordinariness" attributed to this new subject. Finally, I consider the possibility of liberalising the anti-abortion law or - more broadly - social life in general. Furthermore, I will compare the situation in Poland to the situation in Spain, another European country with a strong Catholic tradition, where it was possible to change the anti-abortion law and to counteract the right wing attempts to undo this success. By juxtaposing the actors involved in the debate on abortion in both countries, I will answer the question why Spain managed to liberalize the law, why it was not the case in Poland and whether there is still any hope in this regard.