La lutte pour la légalisation de l’avortement au SénégalRedéfinition des discours et pratiques militantes

Abstract

In Senegal, the Islamic lens has become unavoidable in debates on the legalization of abortion. In this context, women activists stemming from the intellectual and secular elites have focused their advocacy on Islamic law. In addition, they have broadened their uses of law in order to make law useful for women. By working on these two levels, women activists try to negotiate a reform, which could remain acceptable regarding current social norms. These new orientations help to better connect law and social issues and, by doing so, to legitimate the action of the activists in the eyes of women and of the whole society. But keeping the status quo at the legislative level underlines the limits of this strategy. First, the attempt to make Islam compliant with gender has to face its main conservative interpretations. Moreover, the use of the “law weapon” still remains too marginal within the women’s movement to be able to bear some weight in political decisions.