The issue of women's reproductive rights has become an international concern in the recent decade. Ongoing debates on women's reproductive rights in world conferences and conventions have heightened the need for empirical research and theoretical explanations of women's reproductive rights Nevertheless, very few sociological studies have treated women's reproductive rights as a dependent variable.
This study examines the effects of family planning programs and the processes of modernization on women's reproductive rights. Several facets of modernization; processes of socioeconomic development, secularization, women's education, and levels of gender equality are considered. The study involves 101 countries identified by the World Bank (1994) as developing countries. It is argued, on the one hand, that variations in women's reproductive rights in developing nations may be explained by the social changes brought about by modernization processes. On other hand, the universality of the anti-natalistic population policies in developing countries in the late 20th century provides a strong state control over fertility rate, which may contribute to the attainment of women's reproductive rights.
Using linear structural equation analysis, the study finds that fertility decline due to family planning programs leads to the achievement of women's reproductive rights. The empirical findings support the hypothesis that socioeconomic development has a positive effect on women's education, and that there is no statistically significant relationship between modernization and gender equality. The results of the study, meanwhile, indicate that, in developing societies, women's education is negatively related to women's reproductive rights.
The study suggests: first, family planning programs as a social policy in developing countries influence fertility decline, and enhance women's reproductive rights; second, gender equality in society is an important factor that increases the level of reproductive rights for women in developing countries; and finally, the finding that women's education reduces the attainment of reproductive rights may imply the need to develop valid scales for measuring reproductive rights. The findings of this study contribute toward the development of a structural model of reproductive rights.
