The Politics of Abortion in Argentina: A Democratic Constitutionalism Story

This dissertation discusses the history of the politics of abortion in Argentina from the standpoint of democratic constitutionalism. It describes the normative world in which a legal rule criminalizing women who interrupted their pregnancies emerged in 1921, and the slow process through which the rule was re-politicized. The dissertation makes a contribution to the theory of democratic constitutionalism, by highlighting its usefulness for comparative analyses because it is based on common and usual features of democratic societies. It also contributes to the history of abortion regulation in Argentina, by underscoring the life of the law outside courts. Based on social movement theory, the dissertation contributes to the literature that finds that individuals play a very meaningful role in processes of legal and constitutional change