-
55A Hague Convention on Contract Pregnancy : Avoiding Ethical Inconsistencies with the Convention on AdoptionInternational Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics 7 (2): 219-235. 2014.In the past, the Hague Conference on Private International Law has shaped how people can become the legal parents of children born in countries other than their own. It did so by creating the 1993 Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption. It is now interested in developing a convention on international contract pregnancy. We discuss in this commentary what such a convention would have to include for it to be ethically consistent with the Convention on Adoption.
-
50The 'Healthy' Embryo: Social, Biomedical, Legal and Philosophical Perspectives (edited book)Cambridge University Press. 2010.Public attention on embryo research has never been greater. Modern reproductive medicine technology and the use of embryos to generate stem cells ensure that this will continue to be a topic of debate and research across many disciplines. This multidisciplinary book explores the concept of a 'healthy' embryo, its implications on the health of children and adults, and how perceptions of what constitutes child and adult health influence the concept of embryo 'health'. The concept of human embryo h…Read more
-
50“Embryo Autonomy?” What About the Autonomy of Infertility Patients? (review)American Journal of Bioethics 5 (6). 2005.A review of S. M. Liao's "Rescuing human embryonic stem cell research: The blastocyst transfer method," American Journal of Bioethics 5(6), 2005: 8:16.
-
46A Review of Autonomy and Trust in Bioethics, by Onora O'Neill (review)American Journal of Medical Genetics 121 (1): 85-87. 2003.
-
42Parental Licensing and DiscriminationIn Anca Gheaus, Gideon Calder & Jurgen de Wispelaere (eds.), The Routledge Handbook of the Philosophy of Childhood and Children, Routledge. pp. 202-212. 2018.Philosophical theories about parental licensing tend to pay insufficient attention to forms of discrimination that may be inherent in, or result from, a system of parental licensing. By situating these theories in relation to the status quo on parental licensing, we aim to show how many of them reinforce what philosophers have called “biologism”: the privileging of families formed through biological reproduction over families formed in other ways. Much of our discussion focuses on biologism, alt…Read more
-
39Conscientious Autonomy: What Patients Do vs. What Is Done to Them (review)Hastings Center Report 35 (5): 5. 2005.Letter to editor of the Hastings Center Report on R. Kukla’s “Conscientious Autonomy: Displacing Decisions in Health Care” (HCR 35(2), 2005: 34-44).
-
36My Relational Autonomy and My Relationship with Susan SherwinInternational Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics 13 (2): 9-11. 2020.I want to get both personal and philosophical in this piece. I want to reflect on how my relationship with Sue Sherwin has fostered my own relational autonomy. At the same time, I want to discuss what theories of relational autonomy, like Sue's, add to the bioethics literature on autonomy. With this second objective, I hope to begin clearing up some confusion that I see in this literature about the nature of relational autonomy.Sue was my PhD supervisor, but more than that, she has been my mento…Read more
-
32Let Conscience Be Their Guide? Conscientious Refusals in Health CareBioethics 28 (1). 2013.The introduction to a special issue of the journal Bioethics that we edited.
-
32Authenticity and the Hijacked BrainAmerican Journal of Bioethics 2 (2): 62-63. 2002.A review of Louis Charland's paper, "Cynthia's Dilemma: Consenting to Heroin Prescription," American Journal of Bioethics 2(2), 2002: 37-47.
-
27Conscience in Reproductive Health Care: Prioritizing Patient InterestsOxford University Press. 2020.Conscience in Reproductive Health Care responds to the growing worldwide trend of health care professionals conscientiously refusing to provide abortions and similar reproductive health services in countries where these services are legal and professionally accepted. Carolyn McLeod argues that conscientious objectors in health care should prioritize the interests of patients in receiving care over their own interest in acting on their conscience. She defends this "prioritizing approach" to consc…Read more
-
26My Gender Made Me Do it: Gender Identities and the Genetics of AlcoholismThe Bioethics Examiner 4 (1). 2000.
-
25Feminist Approaches to Moral LuckIn R. Hartmann, Hartmann R. ian M. Church, Ian M. Church & Robert Hartmann (eds.), Routledge Handbook of the Philosophy and Psychology of Luck, Routledge. pp. 426-35. 2019.To a large extent, what we do and the circumstances we find ourselves in are beyond our control. Yet this fact presents a problem for the common view that we can be held responsible only for what we have direct control over. If we have control over very little, if anything at all, then to what extent can we be held responsible? A typical response by feminist philosophers is to accept the absence of control—or in other words, the presence of luck—but to insist that responsibility remains often e…Read more
-
25Justified Asymmetries: Positive and Negative Claims to Conscience in Reproductive Health CareAmerican Journal of Bioethics 21 (8): 60-62. 2021.A peer commentary on an AJOB article by Kyle Fritz called "Unjustified Asymmetry: Positive Claims of Conscience and Heartbeat Bills."
-
24A Review of A Feminist I: Reflections from Academia, by Christine Overall (review)Resources for Feminist Research 29 (1/2): 141-144. 2001.
-
24A Review of Dilemmas of Trust, by Trudy Govier (review)The Dalhousie Review 79 (1): 130-132. 1999.
-
19Commentary on ‘Four types of gender bias affecting women surgeons, and their cumulative impact’ by Hutchison (review)Journal of Medical Ethics 46 (4): 242-243. 2020.The central concerns of Hutchison’s paper are the under-representation and unequal pay of women in surgery and the role that subtle gender biases play in explaining these phenomena. My comments focus on how well executed and important this work is and also why we need more of it to fully understand the gravity of the situation for women in surgery and how it compares with similar situations for women in other fields.
-
18Does Gift Language Elevate Devalued Forms of Motherhood? (review)Medical Humanities Review 15 (1): 2001. 2001.A review of Transformative Motherhood: On Giving and Getting in a Consumer Culture, edited by L. Layne (NYU Press, 1999).
-
18A Review of Genes, Women, Equality, by Mary Briody Mahowald (review)International Network on Feminist Approaches to Bioethics Newsletter 8 (1): 13-14. 2000.
-
17A Review of Diagnosis Difference: The Moral Authority of Medicine, by Abby Wilkerson (review)Ethics 111 (3): 670. 2001.
-
17Choice in Fertility Preservation in Girls and Adolescent Women with CancerCancer 107 (S7): 1686-1689. 2006.With the cure rate for many pediatric malignancies now between 70% and 90%, infertility becomes an increasingly important issue. Strategies for preserving fertility in girls and adolescent women occur in two distinct phases. The first phase includes oophorectomy and cryopreservation of ovarian cortex slices or individual oocytes; ultrasound-guided needle aspiration of oocytes, with or without in vitro maturation, followed by cryopreservation; and ovarian autografting to a distant site. The secon…Read more
-
17Dependency Relations as a Starting Point for Justice (review)Hastings Center Report 30 (5): 44-45. 2000.A review of Eva Kittay's Love's Labor: Essays on Women, Equality, and Dependency (Routledge, 1999).
-
16Responding to My “Critics”International Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics 15 (2): 161-166. 2022.A response to comments, published in this issue, on McLeod’s book, Conscience in Reproductive Health Care: Prioritizing Patient Interests (Oxford 2020).
-
14A Summary of Conscience in Reproductive Health Care: Prioritizing Patient InterestsInternational Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics 15 (2): 131-136. 2022.At the 2022 Central American Philosophical Association meeting, there was an Author-Meets-Critics session on Carolyn McLeod’s book, Conscience in Reproductive Health Care: Prioritizing Patient Interests. The event was organized and chaired by Heather Stewart and sponsored by the APA Committee on the Status of Women and Kate Norlock, chair of that committee. There were four speakers, including McLeod and three “critics”: Javiera Perez Gomez, Alison Reinheld, and Jennifer Parks, who were all gener…Read more
-
8Review of Autonomy and Trust in Bioethics by Onora O'Neill (review)American Journal of Medical Genetics 121 (1): 85-87. 2003.
-
7The Right to ReproduceIn Wendy A. Rogers, Catherine Mills & Jackie Leach Scully (eds.), Routledge Handbook of Feminist Bioethics, Routledge. forthcoming.The reproductive rights of women have been a central topic in feminist bioethics. The focus has been predominantly on the right not to reproduce, and so not to be subject to pronatalist social forces that make motherhood compulsory for women. That is the case despite many women and other members of marginalized groups experiencing anti-natalism, or in other words, social pressure to avoid biological reproduction. For these groups, the right to reproduce is as important, if not more important, th…Read more
-
5Morally Justifying Oncofertility ResearchIn Teresa Woodruff, Lori Zoloth, Lisa Campo-Engelstein & Susan Rodriguez (eds.), Oncofertility: Reflections from the Humanities and Social Sciences, Springer. pp. 187-194. 2010.Is research aimed at preserving the fertility of cancer patients morally justified? A satisfying answer to this question is missing from the literature on oncofertility. Rather than providing an answer, which is impossible to do in a short space, this chapter explains what it would take to provide such justification.
-
Review of Frances Latchford’s Steeped in Blood: Adoption, Identity, and the Meaning of Family (review)Adoption and Culture 9 138-142. 2021.
London, Ontario, Canada
Areas of Specialization
Feminist Philosophy |
Applied Ethics |
Moral Psychology |
Trust |
Reproductive Ethics |