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sex selective abortion, neoliberal patriarchy and structural violence in India

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Feminist Review

abstract

This article explores sex selective abortion (SSA) as a form of structural violence within the broader notion of women’s ‘protection’ in contemporary India. While SSA tends to be framed more generally within ethical and choice-based frameworks around abortion access and reproductive ‘rights’, and specifically in India around preference for sons as a discriminatory, cultural, technological misogyny, this article argues that sex selective abortion in India needs to be understood as an outcome of broader systemic economic, political and social processes. The deepening of neoliberal values through state policies has impacted significantly on social relations, shaping SSA as a manifestation of structural violence. State-driven policies in India reflect a neoliberal governmentality through state patriarchy that is implicit within the neoliberal developmental, governmental and capitalist paradigm of contemporary India. This article argues that SSA is structurally produced and therefore cannot be remedied through awareness-raising strategies such as beti bachao or financial inclusion as a means to ‘protect’ or ‘save the girl child’. Indeed, it is neoliberal economic forces that actively, though seemingly inadvertently, promote anti-women, sex selective abortion as a reproductive strategy, which is then disciplined through neoliberal governmentality. This highlights SSA as a form of gendered and structural, rather than discriminatory, violence.

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Figure 1

Source: Census of India (2011) cited in Eklund and Purewal (2017)

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Notes

  1. The Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana scheme falls under the Department of Financial Services, Ministry of Finance in the Indian government: Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY), https://pmjdy.gov.in/ [last accessed 20 February 2018].

  2. For an image of an ornamental raakhi adorning India Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s photo, see The Times of India, ‘Economic Times blog’, https://blogs.economictimes.indiatimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Modi-Raksha.jpg [last accessed 12 February 2018].

  3. The concept of anti-Romeo dals (or squads) was more or less introduced in the build-up to the February/March 2017 elections as a BJP electoral promise to ‘protect women’s honour’ by placing checks on ‘eve-teasing’ and, depending on the seriousness of the case, to give warnings, to inform parents or to initiate criminal proceedings against the accused. See ‘What are anti-Romeo squads?’ (News18.com, 2017).

  4. Officially known as The Constitution (One Hundred and Eighth Amendment) Bill, 2008 (2008).

  5. Laila Majnu (Majnoo) is a tenth century epic love story that ends in tragedy after Majnu falls in love with Laila at first sight. The story ends in tragedy when Majnu is killed by Laila’s brothers after, in the hope of averting violent confrontation, she disarms Majnu by hiding his arrows.

  6. Nanhi means ‘daughter’ or ‘young girl’, and Chhaan literally means ‘shade’ from the sun but here means protection; therefore, Nanhi Chhaan refers to the protection of the environment and the ‘girl child’.

  7. See the Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Regulation and Prevention of Misuse) Amendment Act, 2002 (2003).

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  1. SOAS, University of London, Russell Square, London, WC1H 0XG, UK

    Navtej Purewal

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Purewal, N. sex selective abortion, neoliberal patriarchy and structural violence in India. Fem Rev 119, 20–38 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41305-018-0122-y

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