The Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs ended the constitutional right to abortion in the United States, but it triggered a serious push to enshrine abortion as a constitutional right in France. Next week, the French Senate will debate and vote on a constitutional amendment that would recognize the woman’s freedom to choose abortion. With an overwhelming majority of the National Assembly already in favor of it, France could be the first country in the world to enshrine an abortion right in its constitution this year. Will the amendment, if passed, actually strengthen access to abortion in France? And is the proposal igniting a new polarization that undermines the future of constitutional abortion rights, in France and around the world? Professor Stéphanie Hennette-Vauchez takes a break from testifying and advising lawmakers on the amendment to joinJulie and Zephyr on Democracy’s Future to discuss.
Stéphanie Hennette-Vauchez is Professor of Public Law at the Université Paris Ouest Nanterre and a fellow of the Institut Universitaire de France. She is an internationally renowned expert on human rights, comparative public law, bioethics, reproductive rights, national security, religious freedom, and feminism. In recent years, she has held visiting fellowships at NYU, Princeton, Fordham, and other American universities, as well as at the European University Institute in Florence, LUISS-Guido Carli in Rome, and several other institutions of research and higher education around the world. Her most recent book is L'Ecole et la République (The School and the Republic) (2023). She is a frequent commentator in the French media on constitutional issues, and has provided expert testimony and advice on the proposals to amend the French constitution to enshrine abortion rights.
Read Stéphanie's article, Why and how to constituitonalize the right to abortion? (in French)
Read The New York Times' coverage of the proposal to constitutionalize abortion in France.