Women’s Birthing Bodies and the Law

Unauthorised Intimate Examinations, Power and Vulnerability

Camilla Pickles, Jonathan Herring, Camilla Pickles, Jonathan Herring

• Publisher: Hart Publishing
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN:
  9781509945535
• eBook ISBN:
  9781509937585
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Jura
• Subtopic: Strafrecht

This is the first book to unpack the legal and ethical issues surrounding unauthorised intimate examinations during labour. The book uses feminist, socio-legal and philosophical tools to explore the issues of power, vulnerability and autonomy. The collection challenges the perception that the law adequately addresses different manifestations of unauthorised medical touch through the lens of women's experiences of unauthorised vaginal examinations during labour. The book unearths several broader themes that are of huge significance to lawyers and healthcare professionals such as the legal status of women and their bodies.

The book raises questions about women's experiences during childbirth in hospital settings. It explores the status of women's bodies during labour and childbirth where too easily they become objectified, and it raises important issues around consent. The book highlights links to the law on sexual offences and women's loss of power under the medical gaze.

Women's Birthing Bodies and the Law includes contributions from leading feminist philosophers, healthcare professionals, and academics in healthcare and law, and offers pioneering analysis relevant to lawyers and healthcare professionals with an interest in medical law and ethics; feminist theory; criminal law; tort law; and human rights law.

Table of contents

• Acknowledgements
• Contents
• List of Contributors
• Table of Cases
• 1. Introduction
• 2. Non-Consented Vaginal Examinations: The Birthrights and AIMS Perspective
• 3. Silence, Acquiescence or Consent: Interpreting Women's Responses to Intimate Examinations
• 4. Female Genital Examination and Autonomy in Medicine
• 5. When a Uterus Enters the Room, Reason Goes out the Window
• 6. Human Rights and Gender Stereotypes in Childbirth
• 7. How Should the Performance of Periparturient Vaginal Examinations be Regulated?
• 8. Including the Victim's Perspective: Can Vaginal Examinations Ever be Sexual Assaults?
• 9. When 'Battery' is not Enough: Exposing the Gaps in Unauthorised Vaginal Examinations During Labour as a Crime of Battery
• 10. Implied Consent and Vaginal Examination in Pregnancy
• 11. Troubling Consent: Pain and Pressure in Labour and Childbirth
• 12. Redressing Unauthorised Vaginal Examinations through Litigati
• Afterword: Unauthorised Intimate Examinations as/and Sexual Violence: Some Epistemic and Phenomenological Considerations
• Index