From Soft to Hard Paternalism and Back: The Regulation of Surrogate Motherhood in Greece
16 Pages Posted: 4 Aug 2009 Last revised: 9 Nov 2009
Date Written: June 28, 2009
Abstract
This paper is a critical analysis of the regulation of surrogate motherhood in Greece; I will discuss the way that a consensus reached in the legislative committee among liberal and conservative jurists on the matter of compensation of surrogate mothers was undermined by intra-party populism in the Greek parliament which banned it to avoid commodification; inevitably the law fell into disuse leading to a new law which allowed government-defined compensation, not the one agreed by the parties; the regulation of surrogate motherhood in Greece is a typical example of the deleterious effects of the combination of legal formalism and legal moralism in contemporary Greece.
Keywords: surrogate motherhood, commodification, legal formalism, legal moralism, legal paternalism, economics of contracts, exploitation, consent, compensation
JEL Classification: I11, J13, K12, K32
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