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This chapter examines how lawmakers had to grapple with whether and how to regulate medically assisted reproduction after the 1988 Baby M court case in the United States propelled surrogate motherhood and related reproductive technologies onto the public policy stage. The chapter compares the public policy approaches of two countries, France and Germany, with the regulatory structures in the United States where the Baby M court case that garnered international attention took place. Specifically, the chapter provides an in-depth examination of the legal and historical contexts of each country's policy approaches in the form of existing national marriage, family, and adoption laws as well as policies regulating human reproduction. Lawmakers' task became even more pressing once citizens began using the court system and traveled abroad to either gain access to proscribed technologies or use them for a lesser fee elsewhere. As a result, Germany developed one of the most restrictive national laws in the world while France established certain legal proscriptions, which are still more far-reaching than the regulatory structures in the United States. Along the way, this developing policy area contributed to the creation of international frameworks governing medically assisted reproduction and the development of national bioethics advisory councils.

The European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology (ESHRE) defines the act of travelling abroad to undergo reproductive medical treatments, including assisted reproduction technology (ART) treatments as cross-border reproductive care. The experiences of patients seeking affordable reproductive care abroad have been widely studied in the last decades (Bergman, 2011a, 2011b; Blyth, 2010; Bracewell-Milnes et al., 2016; Culley et al., 2011; Guerzoni, 2017; Hudson, 2017, 2020; Hudson & Culley, 2011; Kroløkke, 2014a, 2014b; Rodino, Goedeke, & Nowoweiski, 2014; Salama et al., 2018; Shenfield et al., 2010; Van Hoof, Pennings, & De Sutter, 2016; Whittaker, Inhorn, & Shenfield, 2019; Zanini, 2011). However, French women and couples pursuing ART treatments abroad have received little scholarly attention until now. In this chapter, we aim to address this gap in the literature with the results from an ethnographic study conducted with French women and couples who seek ART treatments in Barcelona (Spain) using data from participant observation and in-depth interviews. We begin by discussing the European reproscape, introducing French and Spanish ART legislation, to explain why a large number of citizens are excluded from the French system of reproductive governance and why they choose Spain as their destination. Then, we will discuss the obstacles faced during the reproductive journey, and the impacts of this journey on the embodiment of the treatments are explored, in order to show how French women and couples handle the physical, emotional and cultural displacements that their reproductive project entails.

This paper analyzes how an infertile body is shaped by social discourses and reproductive technologies. Reproductive governances are articulated in this context by ideas and social values regarding family and motherhood, the binomial of infertility-TRA, legislation and norms and health professionals' practices. In addition, it shows how diverse infertile bodies experience (and withstand) these reproductive governances. Various sources have been consulted, including newspapers, biographical books, bibliographic sources from specialized literature and interviews carried out by the author.