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Pinter & Martin Limited - Rebecca Schiller

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90 pages

English

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Publié par	Pinter & Martin Limited
Date de parution	01 janvier 0001
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781780665818
Langue	English

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WHY HUMAN RIGHTS IN CHILDBIRTH MATTER
WHY HUMAN RIGHTS IN CHILDBIRTH MATTER
Rebecca Schiller
Why Human Rights in Childbirth Matter (Pinter & Martin Why It Matters 9)
First published by Pinter & Martin Ltd 2016
© 2016 Rebecca Schiller
Rebecca Schiller has asserted her moral right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved
ISBN 978-1-78066-580-1
Also available as ebook
Pinter & Martin Why It Matters ISSN 2056-8657 Series editor: Susan Last Index: Helen Bilton Design: Rebecca Longworth Cover Design: Blok Graphic, London Cover illustration: Donna Smith Proofreader: Debbie Kennett
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade and otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form or binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
Set in Minion
Printed and bound in the UK by Ashford Colour Press Ltd, Gosport, Hampshire
This book has been printed on paper that is sourced and harvested from sustainable forests and is FSC accredited.
Pinter & Martin Ltd 6 Effra Parade London SW2 1PS pinterandmartin.com
Contents

Author’s Note
Introduction
1 Why It Matters
2 Birth
3 Human Rights in Childbirth
4 Dignity, Autonomy and Choice
5 Life and Death, Consent and Coercion
6 Feminisms of Birth
Conclusion
Rights in Birth: Your Pocket Guide
Further Reading and Resources
References
Index
Author’s Note

In a short book on a huge topic there are inevitable generalisations that don’t reflect the uniqueness of each experience across the spectrum of childbirth. For this I apologise in advance.
Throughout I will use a mixture of ways to refer to those who go through pregnancy and birth, acknowledging that not all people with uteruses identify with the term woman. I will also use the term ‘woman’ but want to acknowledge that reproductive rights and the experiences around them are, of course, pertinent for transgender and gender non-conforming people who may not identify with that term. I use it with awareness that it cannot contain the identities of a number of people to whom all or parts of it may apply.
Partners (fathers in particular), and the role of family more broadly, are again sidelined here. This is partly for reasons of space, but also because I believe it is important to tackle these issues first from the perspective of the key protagonist in the room – who should always be the person giving birth.
Some of the stories, examples and discussions in this book may be triggering for those with previous birth trauma, a history of sexual abuse or those who are living with the ongoing impact of a range of traumas.
I’ve chosen to look at issues around the world, believing that human rights in childbirth, and broader reproductive rights, are viewed more clearly with knowledge across, and access to, more than one part of the spectrum. Shining a spotlight on issues in other countries could have a positive impact on women closer to home. Insisting on local women being treated with dignity and respect should also ripple out to others far away. Despite that, the specific legal framework discussed in this book is often based around English law, though the underlying principles and issues are pertinent to global readers. Signposts to more global information are to be found in the ‘Resources and Further Reading’ section at the end of the book.
Finally, I want to acknowledge that many of us, including myself, have had resoundingly positive experiences of pregnancy, birth and new parenthood. There are numerous obstetricians, midwives, academics, campaigners, doulas, lawyers, journalists and more working to guard and expand these positive realities across the world. It is important to bring the many challenges and inequalities to light, but I firmly believe that, in almost every case, problems are systemic and cultural and not the fault of individual practitioners.
I thank all those working hard to tip the scales for their work, which often goes without recognition. This book is dedicated to them, the women who have shared these most intimate of moments with me, and my husband and children for opening my eyes to another world.
Introduction

I am sitting at my desk wondering how I came to be a human rights in childbirth activist. There are tiny, crisp moments in my life that stand out. I roll them around my mind like grains of salt across a palm. Minutes of time that I could have forgotten, but instead have left their residue across my life. Tangy and sharp-edged. It was inevitable that I’d choose this work eventually.
It was me sitting next to that girl at school. The one being picked on because she was different. Hating unfairness to the point of tears. I discovered what rage felt like when a teenage classmate told me that women who had abortions were evil and would go to hell. The idea that something arbitrary could be used to stop a vulnerable group exercising a basic right, or judge them harshly if they did, set something up in my brain. A little alarm that then went off when I saw the pattern repeated.
Travelling in Bosnia with a university friend I became interested in human rights in war. I held in my hands the names of 8,000 men and boys massacred at Srebrenica in 1995 – a dossier painstakingly compiled by one of their mothers. It was all that was left of her son and his fellow victims. In presenting each of the names and asking us to read them she reminded us of the lost individual. She took us behind the horror of the number ‘8,000’ to see that there were human beings here who should have been entitled to more. Exposing their humanity to show us why the lives of individuals matter.
Then, much later, in my work as a doula, I saw incredible strength, superb care, enduring compassion, love, support and professional excellence. The very best of life squared up to some of the worst. My injustice alarm began to ring and it is yet to stop. I found out that words like ‘woman-centred’ were thrown around easily, but were often weighted down with a heavy burden of women being put firmly in their place.
In birth rooms I witnessed things that I could barely believe could happen in contemporary England. The tendrils of a patriarchy I’d never realised had much to do with me were so firmly entangled in maternity care. I’d been lucky enough never to personally experience how fragile the illusion of women playing a full and equal part in society was. But here, in a context where I wasn’t looking for it, was the evidence.
The ‘Am I allowed?’ question came out of pregnant women’s mouths with alarming regularity. The answer from the system was often ‘no’. The power balance in birth, the negative political and moral discourse around women’s agency in reproduction, the repeated judgements, pressures and constraints: I didn’t have to do more than creep in to a couple of labour wards to see them all laid bare.
There is one birthing woman I will never forget. I watched her shout ‘no’ repeatedly while fingers, then instruments, were repeatedly inserted into her vagina. There was no ambiguity about her wishes and no attempt to defer to them. She did not give consent, but they carried on regardless. As if she was inanimate.
I held her hand and soothed her, feeling complicit. Not knowing how to stop what was clearly an abusive crime presented as a matter of routine. Something that ‘good girls’ should endure for the sake of their babies. I realised that these abuses were repeated to a greater and lesser degree every day and that we weren’t allowed to complain about it. If we did, we would be sucked in to a distracting vortex of ideological birth talk. Women against women, arguing about birth pools vs epidurals and whether caesareans or free births were a safer or a more ‘empowered’ way of giving birth. Constantly steered away from the real issues around women’s autonomy in birth.
So when I met Elizabeth Prochaska, an inspiring human rights barrister with an interest in maternity care, everything began to drop neatly into place. Elizabeth had been doing some pro bono (volunteer) work giving legal advice to midwives. She rang me to tell me that she had just succeeded in ensuring that a local NHS Trust provided independent midwives to women while the NHS homebirth service was suspended. I had a client deeply affected by the service suspension and Elizabeth’s work meant that, instead of having to overcome a significant fear of hospital, Jennymay birthed at home with midwives she had time to get to know and who returned to care for her postnatally. There was real power in what Elizabeth was doing.
At the amazing first Human Rights in Childbirth conference at The Hague in 2012 Elizabeth told me she was thinking of starting a charity to house her pro bono maternity-focused work. A place where the human rights principles and framework could be used to improve maternity care. We started Birthrights in January 2013 with a board of lawyers, midwives, doctors and service users to drive change forwards. And since 2015 I have been its chief executive.
Over the past three years my outlook on and focus within the birth world has changed. I’ve moved away from some of what drew me in and in some instances entirely changed my opinion. I make no apology for that, but the process of doing so has been difficult and at times I’ve wondered how I could reconcile the different areas of my work.
In some ways this book is a selfish attempt to stitch my different interests and perspectives together. To think about why rights in childbirth are violated. To place these rights in their broader context as part of the feminist project and wider reproductive righ