Coercive Sterilisation – an Example of Multiple Discrimination
Coercive Sterilisation – an Example of Multiple Discrimination

Summary/Abstract: The coercive sterilisation of Romani women is well documented across Europe in both law and practice, both past and present. Take for instance the case of Czechoslovakia, where a Public Decree on Sterilisation from 1972 enabled the government to take specific steps to encourage the sterilisation of Romani women in order to reduce the birthrate of the Romani population, which they characterised as “high [and] unhealthy”. This legal provision resulted in giving the government more or less free reign to systematically sterilise Romani women without their full and informed consent. Similarly, Hungarian legislation during the socialist regime included provisions that enabled authorities to sterilise Romani women without their full and informed consent. In the past, similar governmental sterilisation campaigns have been found in, for instance Sweden, against women belonging to the Romani minority.

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