The Depersonalisation of Women through the Administration of ‘In Vitro Fertilisation’

Abstract

‘In vitro fertilisation’ is a series of technological procedures designed by medical scientists to intervene in, alter and extract parts of the bodies and to interfere with the reproductive processes of women. It has been offered, received and lauded by medical scientists, the press and various government committees as ‘progress’, as caring, and as a response to the needs and demands of infertile couples. Representations of, descriptions of and public debates about ‘in vitro fertilisation’ have been dominated by a rhetoric of benevolence and remarkably lacking in critical assessment, particularly regarding its impact on women’s health and autonomy. Feminist challenges and resistance to this a priori assumption of medical scientific beneficence and particularly our attempts to re-orient analysis of ‘in vitro fertilisation’ in terms of women’s reproductive rights and women’s liberation, generally have not been given recognition or serious consideration in so-called ‘public’ forums of discussion about the implications of this technological innovation. My intention in this chapter is critically to examine ‘in vitro fertilisation’, specifically in terms of how it effects women’s health and social status. In so doing I will challenge the image of benevolence that has so far dominated its representations. I will argue that it is an image which has depended on, and is only possible through, exclusion of attention to the meaning of ‘in vitro fertilisation’ for women.