Contraception. Family planning: by whom and for whom?

PIP: Many people consider family planning to be the cure for population growth and its consequences (poverty, child mortality, morbidity, depletion of natural resources, and environmental degradation). International organizations support family planning programs and population-political strategies control their operations. Other key players in family planning are the pharmaceutical industry, the churches, and governments. Women tend not be involved in developing population and family planning policies, however, but instead implement the policies. Population planners are generally not interested in family planning methods which give women control over their own bodies, e.g., female-controlled barrier methods. In fact, they distrust them because the planners consider women to be unreliable. Besides, the low effectiveness of these methods means women need to rely on abortion, which is a problem in many developing countries, e.g., Latin America. Further, family planning programs must meet predetermined goals, so their service is lacking, e.g., limited supply of contraceptives and not enough time to provide information to clients. Family planning revolves around women. For example, they encourage them to talk their partners into approving the women's use of contraception, but this is almost always difficult for women in developing countries. Provision of family planning cannot be successful without society accepting and treating women as full citizens. In addition, society needs to realize that women have a sexuality separate from men. Political will is needed for these changes in attitude. The international women's movement does not agree on the degree which women can control contraceptives themselves. Women's groups are working to improve the position and independence of women and contraception is just 1 factor which can help them achieve this goal. The Women's Sexuality and Health Feminist Collective in Sao Paulo, Brazil, is an example of a coalition of women's health groups.^ieng