The Politics of the Body in Weimar Germany - Women's Reproductive Rights and Duties

This book analyses how the Weimar Republic put Germany in the forefront of social reform and women's emancipation with wide-ranging maternal welfare programmes and labour protection laws. Its enlightened policy of family planning and liberalised abortion laws offered women a new measure of control over their lives. But the new politics of the body also increased state intervention, the power of the medical profession and the tendency to sacrifice women's rights to national interests whenever the Volk seemed in danger of 'racial decline'.

List of contents

List of Plates - Preface - List of Abbreviations - Introduction: Historic Background to the Population Debate - Maternity: Production Versus Reproduction - Sexuality: The Battle against Sexual Immorality - Contraception: A Cure for the Body Politic - Abortion: Politics and Medicine - Conclusion - Appendices - Notes - Bibliography - Index

Summary

This book analyses how the Weimar Republic put Germany in the forefront of social reform and women's emancipation with wide-ranging maternal welfare programmes and labour protection laws.

Product details

• Authors: Cornelie Usborne
• Publisher: Springer Palgrave Macmillan
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 01.01.1992
• EAN: 9780333547717
• ISBN: 978-0-333-54771-7
• No. of pages: 324
• Dimensions: 141 mm x 233 mm x 22 mm
• Weight: 564 g
• Illustrations: XX, 324 p.
• Series: Studies in Gender History; Studies in Gender and History
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Psychology > Applied psychology; Non-fiction book > Psychology, esoterics, spirituality, anthroposophy > Applied psychology; Social sciences, law, business > Ethnology > Folklore