Description
Book SynopsisThe Lure of Hope portrays a snap shot of the rise and fall of commercial surrogacy in India. By chance, the author’s fieldwork began around the same time NSW legislation in Australia extended its ban on commercial surrogacy to include overseas arrangements. Not long after returning from fieldwork in India, the Home Ministry of India changed the conditions of entry for intending parents (IPs) traveling to India for a surrogacy arrangement. From November 2013 IPs would have to apply for a medical visa, and could only obtain a medical visa for surrogacy if they had been married for at least two years. In 2016 the Indian Surrogacy (regulation) Act was introduced, commercial surrogacy was banned and foreigners were no longer able to enter into surrogacy arrangements in India. India was the first among a trail of ‘pop up’ reproductive destinations including Thailand, Nepal, Mexico, Cambodia and Laos. This book captures a moment in the recent history of the emerging global ‘surroscape’. Alongside the detailed account of the experiences of parents and surrogate mothers the author offers a careful analysis of regulatory systems governing surrogacy and embryo use in Australia and India. With the authors archival research in the UK she further analyses the regulation of surrogacy with cross cultural comparison of the relatively longer history of surrogacy regulation in the UK. Reproductive technologies and the many options these create are ahead of the law and while the law struggles to keep up we have a rich field of investigation. What do different regulatory systems tell us about how we see society, children, women’s bodies, reproduction and fecundity, kinship and family formation?
Trade ReviewThis is one of the first ethnographies to follow the hopeful journeys of intended parents seeking surrogacy overseas. This highly accessible book breaks down stereotypes of intended parents as they negotiate the Indian surrogacy industry to form families. Stockey-Bridge show sensitivity, sophisticated analysis and empathy with her informants. She offers an important perpesctive to our understanding of overseas surrogacy. -- Andrea Whittaker, professor of anthropology, ARC Future Fellow, and convenor at Monash University
Dr Stockey-Bridge's research involving Australian adults undertaking commercial surrogacy arrangements in India, Indian surrogates and staff in Indian fertility clinics engaged in surrogacy arrangements provides a unique insight into international surrogacy in India. This book makes a significant contribution to existing knowledge and understanding of international commercial surrogacy practice, policy and legislation. -- Eric Blyth, emeritus professor at the University of Huddersfield
Table of ContentsPreface Acknowledgments Introduction Chapter 1: Genealogies of Transnational Commercial Surrogacy: Australia and India Chapter 2: Surrogates in India: Class and Social Context Chapter 3: The Intending Parents: the Narrow Pathways of IP Journeys Chapter 4: Finding the Clinic: Surrogate Recruitment Networks and the Saleable Body Chapter 5: Caretakers and Conversion: Caretaker Narratives Chapter 6: The Lure of Hope: Locating the Clinic and Finding Hope Chapter 7: The Rhetoric of Tragedy and the Experience of Disaster Chapter 8: Transnational Surrogacy, Kinship, Connectedness and the Gift Conclusion Terminology References Appendix About the Author
