Call for Papers

The Section on Family & Juvenile Law is pleased to announce a Call for Papers for its substantive panel at the 2024 AALS Annual Meeting to be held January 3-6 in Washington, D.C. The theme of the overall conference is Defending Democracy, and the theme of the panel is reproductive justice, broadly construed. For roughly five decades, from Roe to Dobbs, bodily and reproductive autonomy were an essential suite of fundamental rights and individual privacy interests enjoyed by people who identify as women. Now, in a post-Dobbs reality, the thin, tenuous nature of reproductive autonomy rights and privacy interests has been laid bare. The once-believed-to-be inviolable rights to reproductive autonomy pose a keen challenge for a society that dreams of democracy.

The committee broadly defines "democracy" and "reproductive justice." Accordingly, we invite people who may not style themselves as reproductive justice scholars or advocates to consider connections from their work to this important issue. We invite both cause advocates who fight/fought constitutional prohibitions against reproductive autonomy and scholars who present imaginative, optimistic solutions for regaining basic human rights to reproductive justice. A primary goal of the panel is to hear fresh ideas that have the power to illuminate a complex legal problem within a multi-faceted, interconnected space that can reveal common ground among cause advocates and scholars.  The planning committee seeks proposals generated from a wide-ranging and inclusive understanding of reproductive justice for an interactive panel experience. Potential topics might include, but are by no means limited to, abortion; the impact of Brackeen and other developments in adoption law and policy; how reproductive justice interacts with marginalization on multiple levels; reproductive justice issues related to juveniles, and connections between reproductive justice issues and the use of reproductive technologies.  

Please submit a proposal of 400-600 words by July 15, 2023.  Submissions should be sent to Cynthia Godsoe [email protected] , Kim Hai Pearson [email protected], and Stephanie Tang [email protected]. We plan to announce the selected panelists by August 1, 2023. The committee looks forward to your expansive thinking and creativity.