Rewriting abortion in mexican biopolitics: feminist strategic litigation as counterconduct

Abstract

This article analyzes the decriminalization of abortion in Mexico through Foucaultian categories of biopolitics, dispositif, and counter-conduct, articulated with Penelope Deutscher’s contributions on the dispositif of reproductivity. The aim is to investigate how feminist strategic litigation can be understood as a practice of counter-conduct, that is, a form of resistance situated within governmentality, capable of displacing modes of life management without dismantling the state structure. The hypothesis advanced is that feminist action has promoted a shift in the dispositif of reproductivity, altering its normative articulation around compulsory motherhood. To this end, a qualitative and interpretative approach was conducted on the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation’s decisions, Acción de Inconstitucionalidad 148/2017 and Amparo en Revisión 267/2023, showing how strategic litigation transformed the framing of abortion: from crime to a matter of public health, from punishment to the guarantee of reproductive rights. It is argued that these decisions do not dismantle dismantle the dispositif of reproductivity but reinscribe it in new forms of governmentality, in which bodies with the capacity to gestate remain objects of state management. The article concludes that the decriminalization of abortion represents a first step in an ongoing process of normative and political transformation, in which feminist action demonstrates its ability to reorganize power relations within governmentality.