Medically assisted reproduction and non-normative family forms: legislation and public opinion in Europe

Marie-Caroline Compans and Hannah Zagel

EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, 2025, vol. 27, issue 1, 203 pages

Abstract: This paper explores the relationship between access legislation of medically assisted reproduction (MAR) and public attitudes towards family structures in Europe. It contributes to understanding the contextual frameworks that may facilitate the formation of a family outside the different-sex couple norm. The permissiveness of MAR policies has received political attention owing to its potential to revolutionize family formation, with varying regulatory routes among states regarding access for single individuals and same-sex couples. We particularly examine regulatory trends in granting MAR access to single women and lesbian couples in Europe, and how legislation aligns with attitudes towards single motherhood and same-sex parenthood. Utilizing descriptive analysis and two-level models on original MAR legislation data across 36 European countries and the European Values Study (2008–10 and 2017–20) for attitudes, we show that MAR access is granted to lesbian couples in contexts where same-sex parenthood is accepted. By contrast, legalized MAR access for single women seems rather disconnected from public opinion towards single motherhood. As a whole, the paper delineates contexts in which the combination of social acceptance and legal permissibility of MAR use for non-normative prospective parents may favor the formation of ‘new’ family forms.

Keywords: Medically assisted reproduction; MAR policies; same-sex parenthood; single motherhood; Europe (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/320723/1/F ... dically-assisted.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zbw:espost:320723

DOI: 10.1162/euso_a_00003

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters from ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics ().