Joshua E. Perry on the Biopolitics of Gonzales v. Carhart

Joshua E. Perry (Vanderbilt University Medical Center) has posted Partial Birth Biopolitics on SSRN. Here is the abstract:

The United States Supreme Court decision in Gonzales v. Carhart upheld the constitutionality of the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban of 2003, despite the law's failure to include an exception for the health of the mother. This paper argues that the Court's decision in Carhart opens new doors for future politicized governmental interference in the lives of patients and their doctors. Those concerned with biopolitics, the use of governmental power to regulate and control the personal and private space of one's health care decisions, have new reasons to be worried about the future of reproductive freedoms and the exercise of clinical medical judgment.