Torture and Ill-Treatment, Forced Sterilization and Criminalization of Self-Induction

The U.N. Special Rapporteur on Torture’s 2016 report A/HRC/31/57 catalyzes and reinforces key developments in international law recognizing the impact that gender, intersecting with other identities, has on torture and ill-treatment. This article examines forced sterilization and criminalization of self-induced abortion. It explores the role that “entrenched discrimination, patriarchal, heteronormative and discriminatory power structures and social gender stereotypes” play in perpetuating forced sterilization and criminalization of self-induced abortion, the serious harms that flow from these practices, and their disproportionate impact on ethnic or racial minorities, immigrants, people with disabilities, and people living in poverty.