Can the criminalization of reproductive rights be a nationalist project? An analysis of the 5069/2013 bill in the Brazilian National Congress

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to investigate a federal bill pending analysis in the Brazilian Federal Congress - the 5069/2013 bill - which seeks to criminalize further women's capacity to control issues relating to their sexual health in the country. By analyzing this bill, as well as the political discourses surrounding its proposal and the current arguments for its approval, I seek to highlight the social and political roles attributed by it to Brazilian women, focusing on the implications of the adoption of the nationalist discourse of the bill in official state discourse, should it become law, especially with regards to what the nationalism literature refers to as the "biological and cultural reproduction of the nation, " as well as the impact that these new definitions have on Brazilian women's citizenship.