Abortion Surveillance 1981 Publ 1985

First published in 1991. Over the last twenty-five years or so, the debate on abortion has not moved any closer to resolution in either the United States or Canada. The courts, the legislatures, the pulpits, the classrooms, the hospitals and clinics and the media have provided the forums for this on-going struggle. Two groups of activists have dominated the debate. The opponents of abortion, who are referred to as anti-abortion or pro-life, advocate restrictive policies on abortion while the pro-choice groups direct their attempts to creating a permissive policy that allows a woman to make her own decision. The anti-abortion advocates and the pro-choice advocates alike have learned the skills and developed the strategies to advance their own positions. Whatever legal and public policy gains are made by one side are often countered by moves from their opponents. There is available a vast amount of material related to the topic of abortion. From the extensive and diverse literature, this book draws a collection of relevant materials primarily representing aspects of the sociological, philosophical, religious and legal aspects of the abortion issue. Its purpose is to serve as a source bode for those interested in seeing how the abortion debate has been conducted within the recent past. The book also serves as a reference work for further study.

Available for the first time in English, this is the definitive account of the practice of sexual slavery the Japanese military perpetrated during World War II by the researcher principally responsible for exposing the Japanese government's responsibility for these atrocities. The large scale imprisonment and rape of thousands of women, who were euphemistically called "comfort women" by the Japanese military, first seized public attention in 1991 when three Korean women filed suit in a Toyko District Court stating that they had been forced into sexual servitude and demanding compensation. Since then the comfort stations and their significance have been the subject of ongoing debate and intense activism in Japan, much if it inspired by Yoshimi's investigations. How large a role did the military, and by extension the government, play in setting up and administering these camps? What type of compensation, if any, are the victimized women due? These issues figure prominently in the current Japanese focus on public memory and arguments about the teaching and writing of history and are central to efforts to transform Japanese ways of remembering the war. Yoshimi Yoshiaki provides a wealth of documentation and testimony to prove the existence of some 2,000 centers where as many as 200,000 Korean, Filipina, Taiwanese, Indonesian, Burmese, Dutch, Australian, and some Japanese women were restrained for months and forced to engage in sexual activity with Japanese military personnel. Many of the women were teenagers, some as young as fourteen. To date, the Japanese government has neither admitted responsibility for creating the comfort station system nor given compensation directly to former comfort women. This English edition updates the Japanese edition originally published in 1995 and includes introductions by both the author and the translator placing the story in context for American readers.

Based on sophisticated demographic analysis, Legal Construct, Social Concept argues that legal doctrine on social issues is shaped by the needs and values of society rather than by individuals and interest groups and that it evolves in response to social change but has little impact on that change. The book also explains why a substantial body of social science research has found that although law may be effective for some types of economic problems, its impact on social problems is generally small and of brief duration. At least in the United States, legal doctrine seems to operate primarily to provide symbols that enhance commitment to the social system and increase the cohesiveness of the system. Barnett's approach to legal thought derives from the practices and assumptions of the social sciences, particularly sociology, and not from those of critical legal studies. His main concern is with social issues—issues that substantively differ from economic issues. In addressing legal thought on social problems with the conceptual framework and quantitative techniques of macrosociology, he considers a topic that is infrequently investigated and employs an approach that is infrequently used. To illustrate this thesis, Barnett presents data on social patterns relevant to three current issues: sex discrimination, age discrimination, and the availability of contraception and abortion. His analyses of these data are compared to constitutional philosophy, judicial rulings, and federal statutes. Barnett then turns from the evolution of legal doctrine in the past to its possible change in the future and considers whether active forms of euthanasia are likely to be legalized. He concludes with an exploration of additional issues for future research and theory.

In the decade after the 1973 Supreme Court decision on abortion, advocates on both sides sought common ground. But as pro-abortion and anti-abortion positions hardened over time into pro-choice and pro-life, the myth was born that Roe v. Wade was a ruling on a woman’s right to choose. Mary Ziegler’s account offers a corrective.