‘Do no harm’ and cross-border surrogacy facilitation

RMIT Researchers

• Yingyi Luo (PhD candidate (Law))
• Associate Professor Shelley Marshall
• Professor Denise Cuthbert

Project Description

This project proposes ways that Australian law and policies can be reformed to ensure that human rights are recognised and respected in cross-border surrogacy. Parties involved in cross-border surrogacy arrangements are at risk not only in Australia but globally due to the current lack of a principled framework that holds surrogacy facilitators accountable. Although international human rights law has related provisions bearing upon the rights of women and children, these principles of international law are broad and have not been interpreted to apply to facilitators or their companies. This study aims to use the ‘do no harm principle’ driven from the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights as a touchstone for evaluating problems of current practice of facilitation surrogacy in their particulars, assessing whether facilitators in the course of their facilitation activates have effectively avoided exposing vulnerable parities to additional risks.

Theme

Gender

Key Words

cross-border surrogacy, human rights, do no harm

Funding Sources

RMIT Research Stipend Scholarship