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Massive mobilizations for the right to abortion in New Zealand have been organised in the recent period by a united front of women's organizations. In spite of this, at the beginning of April, the government passed a law worded in accordance with a report of the Royal Commission assigned to study the *problem" of abortion.
Apart from the laws passed under fascism, this law is clearly one of the most repressive and inhumane in the world. Even a woman who has been raped does not have the right to abortion. Only cases of incest and mental deficiency are considered "valid" justifications for abortion.
The Auckland Medical Aid Centre, which was responsible for nearly 82 percent of abortions performed in New Zealand, will probably have to close for lack of patients. Only fifteen women have have obtained permission to have abortions since the law was passed. We can imagine the despair felt by all the rest To be sure, this is an extreme example, and a particularly cruel step backward from a situation that in fact enabled a good number of women to obtain abortions under relatively decent conditions. But it would be a mistake to see this as a "slipup" on the part of the ruling class in a given country.
FEMININE CRIMES In most countries in the world, women still do not have the right to abortion. They still do not have the right to freely decide whether or not to have children. And this goes not only for the colonial or semicolonial countries, but also for a country like Spain, where the "democratization" of political life has not yet done away with forty years of Francoism and the omnipotence of the Catholic church where women's social position is concerned. It appears that nearly 80 per cent of the women now in prison in these countries were put there for so-called "feminine crimes", primarily abortion.
In the Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland, and West Germany -to cite only a few examples of capitalist countries where women have been fighting for this right for years-abortion is still punishable, except under very unusual circumstances.
The extend to which the law is carby Jacqueline Heinen.
ried out appears to vary according to the country and area, but one thing is certain- the ruling class is doing everything in its power to forestall having to recognize women as individuals in their own right, free to control their bodies and plan their lives. And when it is finally pushed to the wall by a mass movement demanding liberalization of the law, and forced to surrender, it generally manages to do so at the least possible expense, as shown by the Veil law in France. In addition to all the restrictions this law imposes, it does not provide for reimbursing the cost of abortion through Social Security.
EFFECTS OF THE CRISIS But what comes through most clearly today, in this period of economic and social crisis, is that even in those countries where the law has been liberalized, the governments in office are the first to support the most reactionary wing of the bourgeoisie, which constantly demands the elimination of the meagre rights won. They may do this in an indireet way, through heary cute in public spending (which always results,
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as if by accident, in reducing funds allotted for abortion in hospitals). Or they may do it openly, by inserting restrictive clauses in the law on the strength of parliamentary debates, often on the pretext of being able to better "protect women against abuses."
In Great Britain, for example, for three years there has been one amendment after another, all alike-whether proposed by Labour Party or Conservative Party members-all equally reactionary, and all with one aim: to prevent women from taking advantage of a law that is already quite hedged with restrictions, and to place the decision back in the hands of doctors, husbands, government, and the courts-everyone, that is, except those who have the most at stake.
We have just seen the appeals by the pope to try to prevent any application of the law recently passed in Italy, a restrictive law that makes abortion dependent on the husband's consent, and puts it practically out of the reach of minors. A law that, according to the latest polls, stands very little chance of being implemented in a country where the majority of hospitals are still run by the church (many of them are owned by religious orders).
The pope's appeals to doctors and hospital staff, issued the very day the law took effect, calling on them, as good Christians, to make use of the consoience clause and the right afforded them by law to refuse to perform abortions, do seem to have been widely heeded. The first survey carried out in the capital shows that 90 to 95 percent of hospital workers-nuns made up a large part of the nurses-refuse to perform legal abortions.
DIVIDING WOMEN The attempts to divide womenminors and those of age, native-born and immigrants, white and black, rich and poor-appears to be paying off. Witness the American bourgeoisie's support for the Hyde amendment, which eliminated federal funds, designed to help the poorest women obtain abortions in facilities with very high costs (almost 40 percent of Black women are in this situation). This measure had a domino effect, since a number of state governments rushed to follow the example it set by cutting off funds. In several states, this was followed by attempts by district courts to reintroduce provisions in the law requiring the consent of the husband, or parents in the case of minors.
A further amendment has been proposed that would enable employers to refuse to pay wages to women who have taken time off for an abortion. We should not forget to mention the outlandish requirements for abortion dinics in terms of equipment which are aimed at keeping as many of them as possible from opening, and making them impossible to run because of the staggering financial burden involved.
This amendment was clearly an open invitation to the right wing. In the recent period, this resulted in the use of physical violence by extreme right-wing forces against all those who tried to implement the law. There have been countless attacks on abortion clinics. The arson attack on an abortion clinic in Cleveland, Ohio, is only one example in a long series of crimes committed by groups who make no secret of their racist views.
They are the same ones who, in Puerto Rico and elsewhere, support the population-control policies imposed by the imperialists on ethnic minorities or colonized peoples. Nearly half the female population on the island of Puerto Rico, and almost a third of Indian women in the United States have been forcibly sterilized. There has been talk of a plan by the Agency for International Development, which has CIA ties, to forcibly sterilize no less than 100 million women.
There is no need to explain that such measures are aimed above all at women in the Third World countries. But we should note that in Europe as well, forced sterilization is often imposed on immigrant women who enter hospitals after a self-induced miscarriage owing to the absence of legal abortion. Numerous examples of this can be seen in France particularly.
FIRST INTERNATIONAL MEETING Therefore, there is an urgent need for a campaign for legal abortion and contraception, and against forced sterilization. This is what was discussed by the women who attended the meeting in London on June 10 and 11 called by the National Abortion Campaign (NAC)
Although this first international meeting on abortion was not representative enough, nevertheless, it enabled the delegates and observers present to lay the groundwork for a campaign that aims to be massive and open to all forces in the women's movement and labour movement who can be expected to support such an initiative.
Present were representatives of the National Abortion Campaign, the national abortion coordinating committees in the Netherlands and Belgium, CISAI (Campaign for Information on Abortion) from Bologna, women's abortion and contraception centers from Barcelona and Madrid, groups from the women's movement in Switzerland, Paris-based groups trying to launch a campaign to enforce the Veil law, the Labour Party, and the Fourth International.
A date was set for an international day of action next April, with the understanding that regular meetings would be held between now and then. (The NAC delegates agreed in principle to be responsible for the main coordinating tasks). Right from the start there was a general desire not to restrict such a campaign to a European framework, but to do whatever was necessary to see that it assumed truly international proportions. Hence the importance of paying attention to the special problems faced by women in the colonial countries, and not focussing the entire campaign on the demands of women in the imperialist capitalist countries alопе.
Thus the following central slogan was adopted: For abortion, contraception, and women's rights. No to forced sterilization.* Other demands relative to implementing the law, securing funding, establishing clinics, insuring the availability of sex education and contraceptives, and so on, can be discussed in each country depending on the specific situation, and be included in posters taking the special features more into account. But it was proposed at the meeting that an international poster, translated into several languages, be the overall symbol of the campaign, and that a preliminary version be voted on at the next coordinating meeting to be held in Brussels September 23-24.
Among the topics to be discussed are the text of a call for the day of action, methods of building the campaign and coming up with the necessary funds, and the type of propaganda to use to see that it gets the widest possible response.
The newsletter Donna published by the CISAl group has offered to serve as the liaison for this campaign, and the written contibutions that have been requested for the September meeting will be the basis for articles that will be submitted for publication in the feminist press in various countries, or perhaps for an information bulletin inside a given country.
The fundamental goal, of course, is to arrive at unitary committees in cach country, uniting the largest number of feminist groups, political organizations, and trade unions, ready to launch a vigorous battle for women's inalienable right to control their bodies and decide their own fate.
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