Reproducing politics: the politicisation of patients' identities and assisted reproduction in Poland and Sweden

Abstract

This article examines how discourses on assisted reproductive technologies are locally appropriated, translated or contested in the specific cultural and political contexts of Poland and Sweden. The aim is to investigate how two national patients' organisations, namely the Polish association Nasz Bocian and the Swedish organisation Barnlängtan, articulate rights claims in the context of reproductive technologies. To this end, we investigate how these organisations utilise specific context-dependent and affectively laden political vocabularies in order to mobilise politically, and discuss how each of these two groups gives rise to a different set of politicised reproductive identities. In order to trace which political vocabularies the respective organisations utilise to mobilise their respective rights claims, we draw primarily on political discourse theory and concepts of political grammars and empty signifiers. Lastly, we discuss which political reproductive identities emerge as a result of these different versions of political mobilisation around assisted reproductive technologies.