A Womb of One's Own

“A Womb of One’s Own provides a timely, essential account of the role of medicine in US abortion politics. Using a genealogical approach to theorize medicalized citizenship, Claire McKinney offers a rich interpretation of how medicine mediates political belongs and constructs gendered citizens.” - Jennifer Denbow, author of Reproductive Labor and Innovation: Against the Tech Fix in an Era of Hype

“Over the past 150 years, medicine has operated as a political institution, defining women as reproductive subjects requiring expert governance rather than citizens capable of self-rule. McKinney argues that reclaiming abortion as a citizenship right – while reckoning with medicine’s historical role in women’s subordination – is essential to feminism post-Dobbs. A Womb of One’s Own is a powerful call for a feminist politics that holds liberty, equality, and health together as the inseparable conditions of full citizenship.” - Michaele Ferguson, co-editor of Iris Marion Young: Gender, Justice, and the Politics of Difference

“In this excellently researched and compellingly argued book, McKinney puts abortion at the center of American politics. Feminists have long known that ‘pro-life’ is often code for ‘controlling women,’ but abortion is not just a problem for those with unwanted pregnancies, nor even for all women and queer persons who could become pregnant: it is a problem for all of us. McKinney demonstrates that, as a key ground on which women’s citizenship has become medicalized, abortion reveals the ways in which those in power manipulate the terms of citizenship to exclude certain groups from full membership and recognition and consideration. Whether women, immigrants, citizens of color, the poor, or LGBTQ persons, all of us -including the very doctors who wield power over abortion decisions -can be selected for exclusion on arbitrary bases when it seems convenient to those in power to control us. The role of reproduction in these exclusions and control is central. In the post-Dobbs era, this book is vital reading for the classroom and for feminist politics.” - Nancy J. Hirschmann, co-editor of Citizenship on the Edge: Sex/Gender/Race

Claire McKinney is Associate Professor of Government at The College of William and Mary.

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