This paper investigates whether James Hunter's culture war thesis is an apt characterization of the American abortion debate. The author focuses on three arguments central to Hunter's analysis: 1) that the abortion debate involves two paradigmatically opposed world views; 2) that debate about abortion, since it involves moral discourse, is structurally different than other political debates; and 3) that the new alignments in abortion politics are culturally significant. Examining existing research in each of these three domains, the author finds that the debate over abortion is more complex than suggested by Hunter. World views of pro-life and pro-choice activists, for example, share a commitment to some overlapping values; the argumentative structure of abortion discourse has a pattern rather similar to that of political debate more generally, and new alignments on abortion, such as that between the Catholic Church and the Southern Baptist Convention, do not displace historically embedded differences in symbolic resources and cultural orientation. As suggested by the author, it may be more helpful, therefore, to think of the abortion debate as an ongoing public conversation about America's cultural tradition and how it should be variously expressed in contemporary laws and practices.
This sociological study examines the "common ground" movement that arose among abortion activists in the US during the 1980s. The first application of the term "common ground" to joint efforts by abortion activists on both sides of the issue is traced, and its meaning to early organizers is described. Discussion continues on the complicated and elusive efforts on the part of grassroots organizations and conflict resolution groups to practice the common ground approach to abortion. The five characteristics of the seminal common ground group in St. Louis were that it resulted from a combined pro-life and pro-choice initiative, it involved activists who publicly distinguished common ground from moral compromise or political accommodation, the activists remained loyal to their abortion activities, the activists agreed to cooperate in efforts aimed at reducing the pressures on women to abort, and common ground involved identifying the overlaps in emerging social thinking. The conceptual difficulties involved with use of the term are included in the reasons given for its virtual disappearance from abortion reporting in the press, which was busy relaying incidents of violence at abortion clinics. The election of President Clinton also stole the momentum from the common ground movement. While the future of movements based on the concept of "common ground" as envisioned by the St. Louis group remains precarious, depending for success as it does on actually changing society, this use of the term bears witness that conflicting loyalties do not preclude the promotion of common good. This meaning of the term is worth pursuing in cultural controversies such as that posed by abortion.
This essay considers the public conflict that arose during the drafting of the Programme of Action of the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) as reflecting a moral argument between interest groups holding different world views. These differences are seen as running through and across civilizations rather than being civilization-specific. The essay opens with background information on the development of the concepts of population control and population stabilization as well as the adoption of national population policies and the goals of population programs. The public conflict over the ICPD is then reiterated and is seen to be something other than the usual "West versus the rest" tension or a "religious" versus "secular" battle. Instead the divide can be broadly categorized as "orthodox" versus "progressive." The contested issues included a conflict over language relating to abortion, marriage and the family, promiscuity and adultery, and development and international migration. The conflict over human rights involved health rights versus nonmedicalized moral norms, individual rights versus family rights, and sustainable development versus integral development. The underriding conflict is seen to be a conflict between those holding orthodox versus progressive world views over who will shape the future. The tactics of this high-stakes conflict included portraying the other side as fanatics, treating the moral debate as a distraction from more important issues, charging the other side with having a hidden agenda, and isolating certain ideas from the possibility of discussion. With 92% of the Draft Programme of Action uncontested, both sides made compromises that resulted in the gist of the text remaining intact. Because the result of implementation of the Programme of Action will be cultural change, the conflict did not end with the ICPD. As the globalization of Western culture proceeds, cross-cultural moral conflicts may arise.
