Margaret Sanger’s Network of Feminists

Author(s):  
Joan Marie Johnson

Many feminist philanthropists believed that economic and political rights for women were incomplete without the right to control one’s reproduction. America’s leading birth control advocate, Margaret Sanger, was a skilled fund-raiser. She carefully managed a network of society women who supported her organizations, publications, and private life. Chapter 6 takes a new approach to understanding Sanger: by moving the spotlight from Sanger to her supporters, it becomes clear that her strategic turn to wealthy women did not come at the expense of her feminism (even if she did drop her socialism), as has been argued by some historians. This chapter shows that women like Gertrude Minturn Pinchot and Juliet Barrett Rublee rallied behind Sanger, creating a Committee of 100 to defend her and promote the birth control movement. Unafraid of being arrested, their personal lives and their birth control advocacy revealed their feminism. Chapter 6 focuses on the ways that feminism undergirded rich women’s donations, compelled them to take on controversial issues, and pushed them to influence Sanger and shape the movement and the American Birth Control League and Planned Parenthood. Furthermore, this chapter demonstrates the social networks of power created by wealthy women.

2018 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 35-53 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ville Suuronen

Hannah Arendt’s support for the “right to have rights” arises as a critical response to the modern biopolitical human condition. While Arendt’s reflections on human rights have received broad recognition, the question concerning the economic preconditions of citizenship in her work remains an unduly neglected subject. This article takes up this issue and argues that, for Arendt, the fulfillment of basic social rights is the sine qua non without which the fulfillment of political rights is impossible. Thinking with and against Arendt, I show that her famous distinction between the private, the social, and the political can be fruitfully reinterpreted as an argument for basic income. When Arendt’s reflections on human rights are read in the light of her ideas concerning technology and automation, she no longer appears as a theorist who ignores social justice, but as a thinker who seeks to counter the modern biopolitical human condition and open up new realms for democratic political action. Instead of ignoring social questions, Arendt argues that with the help of technology, we can strive to politicize fundamental social questions in a way that they would achieve a self-evident stature as human rights, and as fundamental human rights, rise above political debate, even though we would remain conscious of their political origins. Arendt does not simply exclude “the social questions” from politics but argues that this is what all technologically developed societies can strive to do. In Arendt’s futuristic vision, the private life of citizens will be politicized through technological intervention: ancient slaves will be replaced by machines. By comparing Arendt with Foucault and Agamben, I maintain that a critical reading of her work can provide us with a pathway toward understanding the right to life’s basic necessities, to zoe, as a future human right.


1976 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 236-251 ◽  
Author(s):  
Angus McLaren

A host of social movements which had as their goal the improvement of the living conditions of the working classes emerged in England in the 1820s and 1830s. Owenism and Chartism come first to mind, but historians have recently acknowledged the social significance of a number of less well-known groups that proclaimed the benefits of temperance or mechanics' institutes or phrenology or infidel missions. The birth control movement in its early years has as yet received little attention from the historians of the English working classes. A possible reason is that the opposition of the 'pauper press' to the movement has led later observers to adopt the view that it was simply a middle-class Malthusian crusade which set out to convince the poor that the only escape from poverty lay in individual self-help. In what follows I shall sketch out the general lines of argument advanced by the advocates of birth control and their antagonists in the working-class movement. The purpose of the paper is not to provide yet another history of the first neo-Malthusians, but to use the arguments their activities elicited to gain a better understanding of nineteenth-century working-class culture.


1978 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 264-286 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Allen Soloway

Recent studies of the social history of birth control in America have noted the importance of eugenics in securing the acceptance of family planning between the two world wars. Similarly in England the endorsement of contraception as a method of “race improvement” by eugenists in the scientific, medical, academic and ecclesiastical communities greatly enhanced the credence and respectability of the birth control movement. In the anti-racist, genetically more sophisticated climate since the Second World War it is often forgotten how pervasive eugenic assumptions about human inheritance were in learned and socially elevated circles in the early twentieth century. Belief in the inheritability of myriad physical, psychological and behavioral characteristics, identifiable, even quantifiable, in particular ethnic groups and social classes was reinforced by expert scientific testimony, and, perhaps equally important, middle and upper class prejudices.Birth control leaders, whose respectability was always in some doubt, were for the most part no exception and readily mingled with the estimable worthies who adorned the ranks of the elitist Eugenics Education Society founded in 1907. Several officers of the old Malthusian League, including its last president, Charles Vickery Drysdale, and his wife, Bessie, were early if troublesome recruits to the Society, while Marie Stopes, the most dynamic promoter of birth control in England in the inter-war years, joined in 1912, and eventually became a Life Fellow who left the organization a financial legacy, her famous clinic and much of her library, upon her death in 1958.


2021 ◽  
Vol 37 (2) ◽  
pp. 83-104
Author(s):  
Maša Marochini Zrinski ◽  
Karin Derenčin Vukušić

The European Convention on Human Rights, as a main Council of Europe instrument for the protection of civil and political rights, does not guarantee the right to health care. However, the European Court of Human Rights broadly interprets Convention rights, and within the context of Articles 2, 3 and 8 of the Convention it gave certain indications that it might start dealing with the issue of health care. Without going into details of all the mentioned articles, this paper will analyse cases where the Court dealt with the issue of violation of Article 3 due to non-provision of health care outside the context of detention. Namely, within the context of detention, there is a clear obligation for states to provide health care, and the Court often relies on the reports of the Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. What we consider important to point out is the Court’s case-law on providing health care outside the context of detention, given the social character of the right to health care, which goes beyond the civil and political character of the Convention.


2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (100) ◽  
pp. 1209 ◽  
Author(s):  
Encarna Carmona Cuenca

Resumen:El Convenio Europeo de Derechos Humanos no reconoce expresamente los derechos sociales de prestación (a excepción del derecho a la educación). A pesar de ello, el Tribunal de Estrasburgo ha realizado una interpretación extensiva de los derechos civiles y políticos reconocidos para incluir, de diversas formas, la protección de aquellos derechos. Una de las técnicas utilizadas ha sido la doctrina de las obligaciones positivas del Estado. Aunque el Tribunal ha aplicado esta doctrina, fundamentalmente, a los derechos civiles y políticos, podemos encontrar algunas resoluciones en las que establece determinadas obligaciones positivas estatales para proteger derechos como la protección de la salud, la vivienda, la protección social o la protección de las personas con discapacidad. En general, se trata de reconocimientos generales y poco concretos pero, en algunos casos, ha detallado cuáles son estas obligaciones. Esto lo ha hecho, en primer lugar, en casos en que se habían producido daños cuya responsabilidad era directa o indirectamente del Estado. En segundo lugar, cuando se trataba de personas que se encontraban bajo la tutela del Estado, como las personas detenidas o internas en prisiones. Y, en tercer lugar, cuando los afectados eran personas especialmente vulnerables (discapacitados o pertenecientes a la minoría gitana). Aunque se trata de una interpretación incipiente y poco desarrollada, muestra un camino en el que se debería profundizar en el futuro. Es generalmente admitido que son los Estados quienes deben tener la iniciativa en el diseño y establecimiento de los derechos sociales de prestación pero, en caso de conductas y omisiones estatales manifiestamente contrarias a los estándares internacionales, el Tribunal Europeo debería obligar a los Estados mediante sus sentencias a dictar una legislación o establecer políticas que hagan efectivos estos derechos.El artículo consta de una introducción, cuatro epígrafes de contenido y una conclusión final. En el segundo epígrafe se aborda la cuestión de la problemática justiciabilidad de los derechos sociales de prestación. En el tercero se hace referencia a la doctrina de las obligaciones positivas del Estado en la jurisprudencia del TEDH. En el cuarto se apuntan las principales técnicas que ha utilizado el TEDH para proteger los derechos sociales de prestación y, en particular, la extensión del contenido de algunos derechos civiles y políticos. En el quinto epígrafe se analiza cómo se ha utilizado la técnica de las obligacionespositivas del Estado en la protección de los derechos sociales de prestación y, en concreto, del derecho a la protección de la salud y del derecho a la vivienda.Summary:1. Introduction. 2. The social rights of assistance and its problematic justiciability. 3. The positive obligations of the state in the case lawof the ECtHR. 4. The protection techniques of the social rights of assistance in the case law of the ECtHR. 4.1. General approach. 4.2. Application of the prohibition of discrimination of article 14 ECtHR to certain social benefits. 4.3. Extension of the content of several rights recognized in the Convention. 5. In particular: the protection of social rights of assistance through the doctrine of the positive obligations of the state. 5.1. The right to health protection. 5.2. Theright to housing. 6. By way of conclusion.Abstract:The European Convention on Human Rights does not expressly recognize any social rights of assistance (except the right to education). In spite of this, the Strasbourg Court has made a broad interpretation of recognized civil and political rights to include, in different ways, the protection of those rights. One of the techniques used by the Court has been the doctrine of the State's positive obligations under the ECHR. Although the Court has essentially applied this doctrine to the civil and political rights, we can find some resolutions in which it establishes certain positive state obligations to protect rights such as protection of health, housing, social benefits or protection of people with disabilities. Generally, these are general and not very specific recognitions, but in some cases, they have detailed what these obligations are.Firstly, this has been done in cases where there was damage which was directly or indirectly the responsibility of the State. Secondly, regarding people who were under the protection of the State, such as persons detained or interned in prisons. And, thirdly, when those affected were particularly vulnerable (disabled or belonging to the Roma minority). Although it is an incipient and underdeveloped interpretation, it shows a way in which should be further deepened. It is generally accepted that it is the States that must take the initiative in designing and establishing social rights of assistance but, inthe case of state conduct and omissions that are manifestly contrary to international standards, the European Court should oblige States with their judgements to enact legislation or develop policies to give effect to these rights.The article consists of an introduction, four content epigraphs and a final conclusion. The second section deals with the question of the problematic justiciability of social rights of assistance. The third refers to the doctrine of the positive obligations of the State in the Case Law of the ECtHR. The fourth section outlines the main techniques used by the ECtHR to protect the social rights of assistance and, in particular, expanding the scope of some civil and political rights. The fifth section analyzes the use of the technique of positive obligationsof the State in the protection of social rights of assistance and, in particular, the right to protection of health and the right to housing.


1995 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 22-52
Author(s):  
James W. Reed

Beginning in the 1970s, historians and social scientists published a great deal on the birth-control movement in the United States, a subject that had been neglected. They were seeking perspective on the issues raised by profound changes in society that rendered problematic the gender system and family values of previous generations. It is no fluke that these scholars began to write the history of the effort to promote the separation of sex from procreation during the same decade that Congress removed contraception from the practices and information prohibited by the national obscenity laws (1971), and the Supreme Court ruled that married couples had a constitutionally protected right to practice contraception (1965), that the unmarried had a similar right of “privacy” (1972), and that pregnant women had the right to induced abortions performed by physicians during the first trimester of their pregnancies (1973). The Court's affirmation of a limited right to “abortion on demand” in Roev. Wadefollowed a decade of intense political struggle and judicial action at the state level, and Justice Harry A. Blackmun, who wrote the majority opinion, was self-consciously attempting to forge a consensus in areas of human behavior and public policy where conflicts were literally lethal and threatened the social order. In turn, much of the vitality of the scholarship on reproductive history that coincides with changes in the law sprang from the self-consciousness of women.


2007 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 221-241 ◽  
Author(s):  
Klaus Kapuy

For more than twenty years now, the European Convention on Human Rights has been used to solve disputes in social security. This is peculiar since the Convention itself and its Protocols primarily comprise civil and political rights and do not include a right to social security. This article analyses the supervisory bodies' case law to establish how national disputes over contributions or cash-benefits under statutory social insurance and social assistance scheme have attracted the protection of the Convention. It also provides an overview of the types of social security cases which today fall within the ambit of particular rights guaranteed by the Convention. It concludes that the right to a fair trial (Article 6(1)) and the protection of property (Article 1 of the First Protocol to the Convention) are, as a general rule, applicable in the field of social security. By contrast, the protection of family life and the protection of private life (Article 8) have, in social security matters only, only been accepted as applicable in the context of particular branches of social security or in relation to particular groups of beneficiaries.


2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-53
Author(s):  
Yoga Maulana Ibrahim

Social rights for people with disabiltiy need to be protected, including political rights. The operationally political rights consist the right of chce and the right to be elect. The issue arises when people with disability have to face the term of physical and spiritual requirements for president, though neither are not entirely contradiction but technically the implementation of the health physically requirement threatens people with disability to be president. The study aims to explain the legal certainty of people with disability to be president linked to physical and spiritual requirement. This research aims to know physical and spiritual rule and limitations. This research uses normative juridical methods and analysis presented descriptively. This research uses conceptual approach, legal approach, and historical approach. The conclusion of this research is that there is no certainty for people with disability to be president until the government has the implementation which is regulate and affirm people with disabilty to pass the physical health and spiritual health requirements. The arrangement of formulation physical and spritual health was conducted by medical check up by the doctors team and decision made thorough them using medical approach and missed the social approach. While there is no clarity about the limits of form capable in physically and spiritual health to be president linked to people with disabilty as the extent of spectrum of ability.


wisdom ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 103-113
Author(s):  
Armen HARUTYUNYAN

The contemporary democratic states consider the concept of political rights, especially the right to vote as a fundamental pillar above all other rights. The political rights are dominant only due to their implementation: people have an opportunity to exercise their power on the one hand, and transfer their power without any political upheavals on the other. In this regard, it is worth highlighting that the political rights are one of the corner-stone rights for modern democratic rule of law. According to this thesis, we can persist that the problems of the realization of political rights are decisive and highly important even for the declared and transitional democratic states. In this respect, the Republic of Armenia is no exception as the problems of the implementation of political rights are definitely the electoral rights. These rights are among the most acute social problems that young Armenian democracy has faced after the independence. The issues in implementation of the political rights are steadily coupled with the problems of imposing punishments for crimes directed against political rights. As the experience of the Republic of Armenia has shown, the number of crimes directed against political rights has increased over the years. The tendency of the growth of the above-mentioned crimes has objective and subjective reasons. Among the objective reasons, we can note the transitional character of Armenian democracy. As for justice, it should be noted that such problems are inherent in almost all transitional states and especially, for modern countries. It is easier to understand, when we observe the experience of communities, which try to pass from the totalitarian rails of state governance to democratic ones. From the other side, the social and economic reasons of the state, poverty of the population can be considered as an objective reason. In terms of subjective reasons, firstly, the disproportionate punishment for crimes directed against political rights should be pointed out, which are the central obstacles for the implementation of political rights.


Author(s):  
Angelina Lapayeva

We analyze the representatives’ views of the school of revived natural law on the social human rights problem. We note that a key milestone in the state and legal transformations of Russia at the beginning of the 20th century was the consolidation of civil rights and freedoms for Russian citi-zens. We establish that representatives of the school of revived natural law developed a theory of individual rights and freedoms in the context of the re-lationship between the constitutional state with the ethics and morality prob-lems. We doctrinally justify that social rights, along with political rights, oc-cupied an important place in the catalog of human rights classification developed by scientists, due to the fact that they were associated with values such as social justice and social equality. We offer arguments indicating that representatives of the school of revived natural law considered the right to a dignified human existence as the source of social rights emergence, which were a prerequisite for the individual’s social emancipation and an attempt to transform the estate society into a civil one.


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