ABSTRACT
In current debates about the impact of population policies on women, the concept of reproductive and sexual rights is both stronger and more contested than ever before. Those who take issue with this concept include religious fundamentalists, as well as opponents of human rights in general, who associate human rights with individualist traditions deriving from Western capitalism. Some feminists, too, are sceptical about the readiness with which advocates of fertility reduction programmes, whose primary concern is neither women’s health nor their empowerment, have adopted the language of reproductive rights to serve their own agendas.
