We often hear of the ‘Americanisation’ of abortion politics in the UK, but unpicking the substantive threats to women’s reproductive rights in the US can be a challenge. The 2012 bpas public lecture explored the current state of abortion politics in the US and, at a time when abortion appears increasingly politicised in the UK, reflected on what lessons can be drawn by those keen to protect women’s reproductive autonomy elsewhere.

Professor Carol Sanger is a leading international scholar in the regulation of abortion, motherhood, and family. She is the Barbara Aronstein Black Professor of Law at Columbia Law School in New York and a Senior Research Fellow at St. Anne’s College, Oxford.