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This week, Notes from Poland editor-at-large Stanley Bill talks with academic and women’s rights activist Agnieszka Graff about the mass protests against the recent abortion ruling in Poland.
They discuss the motivations of the protests, their striking use of vulgar language, the reaction against the church, the political background to the court ruling, and what might happen next. Graff talks about her own experience of the protests, including the organisation of a street blockade.
On October 22, Poland’s Constitutional Tribunal issued a ruling that will virtually end legal abortion in Poland. It found that abortion in cases where the foetus has serious and irreversible birth defects – which make up around 98% of all legal terminations in Poland – is unconstitutional. The ruling has not yet come into legal effect.
Agnieszka Graff is both an activist and a professor at the American Studies Centre of the University of Warsaw.
Also check out our previous episode on the recent crisis in Poland’s ruling coalition and the reshuffle of the government.
Producer: Sebastian Leśniewski
Main image credit: Adam Stępień / Agencja Gazeta
Stanley Bill is the founder and editor-at-large of Notes from Poland. He is also Professor of Polish Studies and Director of the Polish Studies Programme at the University of Cambridge. He has spent more than ten years living in Poland, mostly based in Kraków and Bielsko-Biała.
He is the Chair of the Board of the Notes from Poland Foundation.
