Reproductive Work in the Global South: Lived Experiences and Social Relations of Commercial Surrogacy in India
通过印度北部商业代孕的质性研究，考察代孕者在资本主义社会关系中的生活经验，分析其作为再生产劳动的价值生成机制及权力不平等，主张保护代孕者的劳动者权利。
This article investigates reproductive work in the Global South which thrives on the commodification of women’s reproductive bodies under local-global reproductive hierarchies, appropriating the process of reproduction for production. Through a qualitative study of commercial surrogacy in north India, it examines the lived experiences of surrogates within the capitalist social relations they are embedded in. Conceptualising surrogacy as reproductive labour which contributes to value generation, the article assesses labour relations at the workplace, for example hostels where surrogates ‘live and work’, and the mechanisms of recruitment, contracting and control which function through dense networks of social and material relations between various stakeholders. The weak bargaining power of surrogates and the immense power of fertility clinics and agents are compounded by the lack of effective regulation and the state’s prohibitionist policy. The article argues for protecting the rights of surrogates as workers rather than the recent ban on surrogacy imposed in India.