State Department Backs Away from Women’s Human Rights

Last Friday, the U.S. State Department released its annual human rights report.  Among the changes from prior years was the elimination of “reproductive rights” as a category for reporting; since 2012, that category had examined access to contraception and abortion, as well as more general issues  of maternal health.  Instead,  the most recent report identifies “coercion in population control,” i.e., coerced abortion and involuntary sterilization, as the sole indicator of human rights in this arena.

In a press briefing on the release of the report on Friday, Ambassador Michael Kozak, the top official in the State Department Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, cautioned against reading too much into the deletion of the “reproductive rights” term.  He claimed that “[i]t’s not a diminishment of women’s rights or a desire to get away from it; it was to stop using a term that has several different meanings that are not all the ones we intend.” 

Referring to abortion, Kozak added, “[w]e don’t report on it because it’s not a human right.  It’s an issue of great policy debate.”

It would be a mistake for domestic advocates to view these changes as only significant in the international arena.  The State Department’s human rights report is a signature, official statement of US policy.  By denying the human rights import of reproductive rights, the report attempts to redefine the domestic debate as well. 

The Supreme Court has affirmed again and again that reproductive choice, including abortion, is a fundamental right, albeit one that is subject to an undue burden test rather than strict scrutiny.  Under current domestic law, the tasks of identifying fundamental rights and evaluating violations of such rights are clearly within the purview of courts; legislative branches cannot impinge on fundamental rights. 

In contrast, “[i]ssues of great policy debate,” as Ambassador Kozak termed abortion, are for the elected branches to resolve.

The Center for Reproductive Rights has criticized the State Department report, noting that the scope of reproductive rights — including “the right to decide the number, spacing, and timing of their children; manage their reproductive health and have access to the information and means to do so” — is well-established under international human rights law.  By terming this issue a “policy debate,” the State Department attempts to unilaterally re-define human rights in both the international and domestic arenas.