Women's and Mothers' Labor: The Stakes of Surrogacy

French controversies surrounding the globalized practice of surrogacy have been given a new impetus since 2014, following several condemnations of France by the European Court of Human Rights. Based on a lack of familiarity with the plural regimes and experiences of surrogacy as well as with the rich literature available on the subject in the English-speaking world since the 1980s, the confusions that corrupt the public debate have not been cleared up yet. This international and multidisciplinary conference intends to carry reflection beyond the tracks of a mere adversarial debate, while analyzing the close interdependance between the various actors involved in the transborder trafic of surrogacy at the social, economical and political levels. It is guided by the following assumption: the global division of reproductive labor generally and especially of surrogacy requires, for its accurate description and evaluation, a reconfiguration of the conceptual and normative categories which, when considered through a non-critical lens, block any kind of legal change. Such is notably the case for those of autonomy and vulnerability, labor and responsibility, motherhood and kinship.