Eugenics and Induced Abortion in Post-War Greece
Eugenics and Induced Abortion in Post-War Greece

Summary/Abstract: Amongst diverse population problems, induced abortions were one of the most crucial in modern Greece. In fact, not only was abortion a population problem, but also medical, social and moral. Τhe practice of induced abortion has to be put in the context of the social changes, medical advances and moral principles of the then Greek society, in order to explain its incidence. Gynecologists, deeply involved in the institutionalization of eugenics in post-war Greece, played an important role in the ‘abortion issue’; either negative or positive. Some of them were proponents of abortion because they earned large sums of money from practicing it, being at the same time unsupportive of contraception. On the contrary, others were against induced abortion and advocates of contraception and family planning. Most of the eugenicists belonged to the second category; however, this was not the case in the event of negative prenatal genetic diagnosis, when they unanimously suggested ‘therapeutic’ abortion. The protagonists were of course the Greek women. Gender equality and emancipation occurred in Greece only after the 1950s. The feminist movement began during the interwar period when many women’s clubs were founded by women living in urban centers. In the rural areas the society was far more conservative than in the cities. The issue of abortion is inextricably linked with eugenics, contraception, social transformation and gender roles. In this respect, the most significant of events in Greek post-war history were: the women’s right to vote in 1952; the revival of the discussion for contraceptives in the 1960s; the change of the Greek constitution in 1975; the enactment of the new law on abortion in 1986.

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