A History of Abortion and Contraception in Queensland, Australia, 1960–1989 - Sex under Conservative Rule

This book looks at the recent history of sex, contraception, and abortion in Australia's most conservative state, Queensland. In western nations, there has largely been a consistent increase in available contraception and access to abortion from the 1960s onwards, yet there are a few geographical exceptions that resisted this trend, including Queensland.
Cassandra Byrnes highlights the multifarious ways sexuality and reproduction were continually constructed and challenged during the second half of the twentieth century and follows the responses of key groups to changing laws and attitudes in a time of local and global sexual and social revolutions. She explores interactions between identities of gender, sexuality, class, age, marital status, and geography to illustrate how specific sexed bodies became liminal sites for legal and medical debate.
This Queensland case study is contextualised within international debates concerning women's reproductive rights and will be of interest to students and scholars interested in the history of reproductive rights, gender, and sexuality.

List of contents

Introduction. 1. Contextualising Queensland: Interconnected and Individual Authorities. 2. Contracepting Queensland: The Emergence of Modern Birth Control 3. Sex Education and Teenage Anxieties 4. Abortion Law Reform in the 1980s 5. Policing and Prosecuting Abortion, 1895-1986. Conclusion.

About the author

Cassandra Byrnes is a lecturer in the School of Historical and Philosophical Inquiry at the University of Queensland, Australia.

Product details

• Authors: Cassandra Byrnes
• Publisher: Taylor and Francis
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Release: 26.12.2025
• EAN: 9781032518589
• ISBN: 978-1-032-51858-9
• No. of pages: 178
• Subjects: Social sciences, law, business > Social sciences (general); Queensland, Postwar 20th century history, from c 1945 to c 2000, Cultural Studies, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Women's Studies, HISTORY / Social History, Social & cultural history, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Anthropology / Cultural & Social, HISTORY / Women, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Abortion & Birth Control, HISTORY / Australia & New Zealand, Social issues & processes, Later 20th century c 1950 to c 1999, Social and cultural history, Ethical issues: abortion & birth control, Australasian & Pacific history, Gender studies: women, Sex and sexuality, social aspects, Gender studies: women and girls, Sexual Behaviour, Australasian and Pacific history, c 1945 to c 2000 (Post-war period), SOCIAL SCIENCE / Human Sexuality