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Susanne M. Klausen is Associate Professor of History at Carleton University, Ottawa, and Senior Research Associate in the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Johannesburg. She is the author of Race, Maternity and the Politics of Birth Control in South Africa.
This meticulously researched volume helps redress the privileging of race and class, together with a persistent gender blindness, in much South African historiography on apartheid. In this powerful and clearly argued study of the apartheid politics of fertility, Klausen shows how Afrikaner nationalism was persistently active in its attempts to control women's sexuality ... Klausen provides complex and sympathetic accounts of the experiences of women of all races caught up in this nightmare world * Anne Digby, Social History of Medicine * Susanne M. Klausen should be commended for writing a book that is compelling, timely, and highly original ... In this elegantly written narrative, Klausen explains that gender and sexuality were just as important as race or class to the construction and maintenance of the apartheid system ...This book would work well in an undergraduate classroom because it has a clear narrative arc. Students of African history, political science, and women's/gender studies will appreciate the complex description of apartheid South Africa, as well as African gender politics more generally. The book will also appeal to historians of modern Africa, as well as scholars of global women's, gender, and sexuality studies. It is certainly not one to be missed. * Alicia C. Decker, American Historical Review * Susanne Klausen has combed archival sources - some never before used - and interviewed several of the principles, adding a new dimension to the debates over reproductive rights in South Africa in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Of great interest is her contention that the South African case fits into the contemporary global situation. In the postwar period, South Africa repeatedly moved in a more conservative direction than the rest of the world. While the rest of Africa moved away from colonial rule, South Africa entrenched white domination. In this case, the rest of the world liberalized social and legal responses to sexuality while South Africa laid down legal prohibitions. * Nancy L. Clark, DeGrummond Professor of History, Louisiana State University * This deeply researched and original book not only examines the history of abortion for both black and white women in South Africa but also locates protests against restrictive policies within the context of international developments, particularly in Great Britain and the United States. The focus on telling the story in part through detailed and complex portraits of individual health providers and activists adds to this book's readability and general interest. The focus on class as well as race, not only among women but also among advocates of liberalizing abortion laws, adds important nuance and complexity to the book's argument. * Iris Berger, author of South Africa in World History and Threads of Solidarity: Women in South African Industry, 1900-1930 * A remarkable contribution to the history of reproductive politics. Klausen, an outstanding scholar, extends our knowledge of the role of anti-abortion laws in maintaining white supremacy in South Africa and sharpens our analysis of these matters globally. Well-written, profoundly important, and a crucial addition to the literature of race, reproduction, and power. * Rickie Solinger, author of Reproductive Politics: What Everyone Needs to Know and co-editor of Reproductive States: Global Perspectives on the Invention and Implementation of Population Policy *
