Anticipating Reproductive Justice

In the 1970s and 1980s women of color, some involved in lawsuits challenging forced sterilization, organized around a broad understanding of reproductive rights that sought simultaneously to combat reproductive coercion and expand access to birth control and abortion. CARASA, the Committee for Abortion Rights and Against Sterilization Abuse, was emblematic of this movement, as it linked race, class and gender analysis, anticipating the intersectional and human rights approaches of reproductive justice. Organizations such as the Welfare Warriors, founded in 1986, also called for a more encompassing version of reproductive justice. Through their activism and multilingual newspaper, Welfare Mothers Voice, the Welfare Warriors advocated for greater support and rights for children and mothers living in poverty.