Advancing Solutions for Reproductive Justice
This series highlights some evidence-based policy solutions that can help advance reproductive justice.
Every person should be able to choose whether and how to have children. Everyone also deserves to have the supports they need to care for their children, keep them safe, and help them grow up as healthy as possible. This extends beyond the legal right to reproductive healthcare: it’s about reproductive justice.
Reproductive justice means every person has the right to:
- Bodily autonomy and privacy
- Have children
- Not have children
- Parent children in safe and sustainable communities
But barriers built in front of some people put reproductive justice out of reach. These barriers—often driven by issues of race and class, and built up over generations—include lack of access to quality healthcare and job opportunities, food insecurity, and poverty. These barriers are linked to health challenges and rising rates of maternal mortality, especially among people of color.
Key Findings
Research underscores the importance of strengthening family support programs and expanding access to promote health equity, with evidence-based policy solutions such as expanding Medicaid coverage, ensuring access to paid family and medical leave, and investing in essential economic supports like SNAP, WIC, and tax credits—all crucial steps toward advancing reproductive justice.
About these Resources
These research roundups provide an overview of significant takeaways, data, and policy recommendations based on RWJF-supported research, aimed at advancing reproductive justice.
Related Content
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Everyone should have access to safe, respectful, and dignified maternal care.
Access to supportive, dignified healthcare during pregnancy should be a basic right. Across the country, birth justice organizations are making this a reality.
Birth and Reproductive Justice
A Policy Agenda for a Healthier, More Equitable New Jersey recommends improving maternal and infant health outcomes by enhancing care, supports, and prevention.
Medicaid
Improving Access to Paid Family Leave
A brief provides background on federal and state paid family leave policies (PFL), highlights domestic and international research that shows PFL provides a range of benefits, and lays out principles for a universal PFL program.
