Description
The Reproductive Justice (RJ) movement, rooted in the intersectionality of sexual and reproductive health rights with social justice, seeks to address inequalities and combat oppression. An essential component in RJ movement is contraceptive autonomy, understood as an individual's right to make and actualize their contraceptive choices (Senderowicz 2020). Despite the advance of the RJ movement, responses to migrant crises often leave populations, such as irregular Venezuelan adolescent migrants (aged 15-19) in Colombia, without access to essential contraceptive care. This study explores policymakers, public health professionals, humanitarian aid workers, and medical staff justifications for who receives what type of care.
Incorporating secondary health data and interviews with key informants and adolescent migrant girls, I examine how actors shape the decision-making power of this underserved population. The findings show that care is determined by the (ir) regular status ofmigrants with long-acting reversible contraceptives (LARCs), preferred for those without continued access to the health system because they are ‘better’. Applying an RJ lens to unpack these claims, I reveal a pattern of constrained agency. One that curtails the ability of adolescent girls to make fully informed and autonomous choices regarding contraceptive methods. Finally, I claim that it is imperative to avoid non-autonomous use of contraceptive methods at all costs. Instead, it advocates for a transformative shift in responses, urging the creation of autonomy-enhancing conditions for marginalised groups within the scope of RJ.
