Commodification of the womb and crime

Abstract

This investigation responded, in the context of the Colombian legal system, to the question of whether it is viable to consider commodification of the womb (womb rental) as a criminally reprehensible behavior, for which four objectives were developed: 1) To describe the historical and conceptual context of commodification of the womb; 2) To establish the existing (legal) regulation in Colombia regarding commodification of the womb; 3) To analyze the legal and jurisprudential management of commodification of the womb in other countries that have regulated that issue; and 4) To determine the legal (penal) constituent elements of commodification of the womb to be introduced in Colombian legislation. We used a hermeneutical, historical, epistemological treatment, which was approached from a qualitative model, of exploratory and descriptive scope, for which the method of documentary analysis was applied in three stages: exploratory, analysis of information, and interpretation. In the exploratory phase, sources of primary information were used: legislation, doctrine, jurisprudence and laws in the Colombian context. In the information analysis phase, different analysis tools were used, such as Document Analysis Worksheets, RAE files, conceptual maps and analysis matrices. The interpretation phase required the articulation of the information analyzed; the conclusions were drawn from critical and problematizing review, in relation to its legal, social and historical context. The research resulted in the creation of an instrument that could be used by the Congress of the Republic to establish a regulation of commodification of the womb, facing the Colombian social reality.