Session: Pregnancy, Parenting and Criminalization: A Social Work Perspective Grounded in Reproductive Justice (Society for Social Work and Research 27th Annual Conference - Social Work Science and Complex Problems: Battling Inequities + Building Solutions)

Reproductive justice is an intersectional, human rights-based framework, social movement and means of praxis, developed by 12 Black women in 1994. It centers the fundamental human rights to: (1) have children, (2) not have children, (3) parent with dignity and respect, and (4) uphold sexual and bodily autonomy. Surveillance and criminalization of Black and Brown bodies perpetuates reproductive oppression and undermines social work’s core values of self-determination, dignity, and anti-racism. This symposium investigates intersections of pregnancy, parenting, and criminalization, highlighting scholarship by early career researchers grounded in reproductive justice.

Study 1 is a critical phenomenological study of the childbirth and pregnancy experiences of formerly incarcerated Black women. Drawing on Black feminist, anti-carceral, and anti-violence frameworks, this study highlights how maternal care for incarcerated women neglects their violence histories—particularly sexual and domestic violence. In doing so, violence is perpetrated through reenactment of trauma and through direct acts, such as shackling during childbirth and other custodial practices.

Study 2 uses qualitative methods to foreground incarcerated mothers’ envisioned futures and how envisioning is a resistance strategy that reaffirms their humanity and dignity. Participants’ visions of the future reveal the various ways in which motherhood identity is negotiated, reclaimed, yearned for, and contested in the face of reproductive oppressions. These findings provide depth to a crucial aspect of reproductive justice: securing and protecting the right for incarcerated mothers to parent safely and with dignity.

Study 3 uses quantitative methods to elucidate the “long arm of maternal incarceration.� Using a sample of 1,099 mother-child dyads participating in a home visiting program for low-income families, a path analysis revealed that incarceration prior to their child’s birth was indirectly associated with greater social-emotional problems in young children via poorer maternal mental health. These findings highlight the need to address systemic forces that may compromise the mental health of women with incarceration histories.

Study 4 uses reflexive thematic analysis to understand physicians’s perspectives on mandated reporting of substance use in pregnancy. Social workers were frequently involved or led decision-making around mandated reporting. Physicians often found social workers to be overly enthusiastic about mandated reporting and perceived that social workers believe mandated reporting leads to positive interventions. These findings have important implications for multidisciplinary care teams, where physicians generally hold greater power.

Study 5 utilizes a modified grounded theory approach to surface multiple ways stigma and discrimination toward childbearing people using drug emerge within health systems. Enacted, anticipated, and internalized stigma in health systems perpetuated risk of overdose, with postpartum women describing avoidance of care and disclosure, undergirded by fear of punitive action and historical mistreatment by providers. These findings highlight the need for anti-racist provider- and systems-level stigma interventions

Through an investigation of pregnancy, mothering, and criminalization, this symposium centers reproductive justice and the possibilities it offers for social work scholarship and practice. For communities living at the intersection of over-surveillance/criminalization and whose parenting and fertility are devalued, reproductive justice provides important strategies for battling inequality.