Understanding Zimbabwean Men’s Involvement in Abortion

Despite abortion in Zimbabwe is legally restricted and socially undesirable, it is still a common occurrence and is mostly unsafe. There is dearth of research that explores the role that men play in abortion. Previous research has shown how Zimbabwean men have seen abortion as a challenge to the control that they have over women. Women who have abortions in Zimbabwe speak in socially sanctioned ways of seeing men as masculine providers and inherently good for children. This reasoning positions men as being providers who are needed for women to keep pregnancies to full term. This chapter problematizes this framework as perpetuating the idea of men as saviours and women as victims. Using African feminisms as a theoretical lens, the chapter then reframes the role of men in abortion. African feminisms provide the tools to reframe the role of men and how patriarchy can be understood. In such theorizing abortion is seen as a form of agency and a rejection of patriarchal understandings of the positioning of women.