ABSTRACT
In both the nineteenth and midtwentieth centuries, the body of the aborting woman was constructed so as to legitimate regulation, ensuring political and economic Analysing industrial foetal protection policies within the framework adopted so far, it illustrates how they rely on dominant/prevailing discourses which construct the female body in such a way as to exclude participation in certain areas of the labour market. This chapter suggestes that foetal protection policies are part of a broader discursive pattern which has seen the removal of the woman from reproductive discourses. Although a number of cases have been settled out of court, the issue of industrial foetal protection, and specifically the legality of policies under federal anti-discrimination provisions, has been challenged within the courts on a number of occasions. Foetal protection policies have been considered by three Courts of Appeals and by the Supreme Court.
