In 1994, a group of Black women gathered in Chicago to uplift the needs of the most marginalized women, families, and communities, before attending the International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo. These women named themselves Women of African Descent for Reproductive Justice, and RJ was born.

SisterSong, a Southern-based Reproductive Justice collective composed of communities of color, defines Reproductive Justice as “the human right to maintain personal bodily autonomy, have children, not have children, and parent the children we have in safe and sustainable communities.” This robust definition goes beyond the common definition of reproductive rights, understood strictly as family planning or access to abortion.

Groundswell Fund, the largest RJ funder led by people of color, argues that the threat to reproductive justice is not because of public sentiment, but rather the systemic disinvestment to protect these ri [...]