Parenthood and Procreation

First published Thu Jan 26, 2012; substantive revision Tue Aug 2, 2016

The ethics of parenthood and procreation apply not only to daily acts of decision-making by parents
and prospective procreators, but also to law, public policy, and medicine. Two recent social and
technological shifts make this topic especially pressing. First, changing family demographics in
North America and Europe mean that children are increasingly reared in blended families, by single
parents, or by same-sex partners, prompting questions of who should be considered a child's parent
and what good parenting requires. Second, the development and proliferation of “Assisted
Reproductive Technology” (ART) raises questions concerning access to the technology, its
permissibility, and its use to enhance future children or prevent the birth of children with certain
conditions. Recent debate in ethics and political philosophy has focused on the following questions:

 Are there any procreative rights? If so, what are they? What, if anything, limits them? When
is it morally permissible to procreate? What may procreators permissibly aim at in choosing
characteristics of potential children? What are the moral constraints on the means of
procreation?
 What are the grounds of parenthood? In what respects is parenthood a biological or natural
relationship, and in what respects a social one?
 What are the scope and limits of parental rights and responsibilities? What must parents
provide for their children? How should their parental responsibilities weigh against other
obligations? What should parents be allowed to do, and when may, or must, public agencies
intervene? What, if anything, does society owe parents?

In the following entry, we divide these questions into three sequential stages: the ethics of
procreation (creating a child), to which we devote two sections, and then becoming parents
(acquiring parental rights and responsibilities), and being parents (holding and discharging parental
rights and responsibilities).

 1. Foundations
 2. Procreative Autonomy
o 2.1 Grounds and limits of a right to procreate
o 2.2 Communitarian conservative perspectives on procreative autonomy
o 2.3 Liberal perspectives on procreative autonomy
o 2.4 Feminist perspectives on procreative autonomy
 3. The Morality of Procreation
o 3.1 Direct and indirect personal interests
o 3.2 The Non-Identity Problem and Impersonal Considerations
o 3.3 Assisted Reproduction
o 3.4 Surrogacy and Contractually Assisted Reproduction
o 3.5 Enhancement
 4. Becoming Parents
o 4.1 Genetic accounts
o 4.2 Labor-based accounts
o 4.3 Intentional and voluntarist accounts
 o 4.4 Causal accounts
 5. Being Parents
o 5.1 Parental Rights
o 5.2 Parental Responsibilities
 Bibliography
 Academic Tools
 Other Internet Resources
 Related Entries

1. Foundations
A parent is someone with weighty rights and responsibilities regarding a given child. Parents
usually have decision-making rights over most areas of their child's life and rights to exclude others
from making such decisions. So long as parents fulfill requirements to nourish, educate, and
provide healthcare for their children, they may make many decisions over how and what their child
eats, dresses, plays, studies, and with whom he or she interacts. Section 5 surveys controversies
regarding the content of these rights and responsibilities.

“Parenthood” has distinct senses: biological, social, legal, and moral. These categories present
problems at the margins. While the idea of a biological parent seems self-evident, modern
reproductive technology complicates it, as a child can have genetic parents (gamete providers, who
supply the sperm or egg) and a third, gestational, parent. Each of these is a biological parent, by
virtue of making a biological contribution to producing the child. Possible technologies such as
human cloning involving transfer of a nucleus to an egg cell, or three-person ART, in which the
nucleus of a fertilized egg would be transferred to a second egg for medical reasons, introduce
further complications, as additional genetic material—mitochondrial DNA—would be supplied by
the egg cell.

Biological parents are commonly distinguished from social parents, who rear the child and are
socially perceived as responsible for it. Adoptive parents, or parents who rear children created with
donated gametes and gestated by a third party, are social, but not biological, parents. (Biological
parents need not be social parents, as biological parents give up children for adoption, donate
gametes, or work as gestational mothers.) The category of social parent presents borderline cases
when a given community does not socially recognize those rearing a child as parents. This might
occur with a mother's unmarried partner, two friends rearing children together, other relatives like
grandparents rearing the child, or when a community participates in child-rearing. Legal and moral
criteria for the acquisition of parental rights and responsibilities should clearly designate whom
society should recognize as having them.

Legal parenthood consists in possessing legal parental rights and responsibilities. In the US, a
pregnant woman's husband is generally presumed to be her child's legal father: marriage, not
biology, underpins the legal relation. This has faced legal challenges from genetic fathers
(Rosenman 1995; see Hubin 2003 on fatherhood). The rise of ART has prompted many questions
regarding assignment of legal parenthood when there are contending claims—as between a couple
who commissioned a contract pregnancy and the contracting gestational mother. They have also
stretched the understanding of parenthood, as when the Ontario Court of Appeal recognized three
legal parents (A.A. v. B.B., 2007 ONCA 2)—a lesbian couple and sperm donor.

Legal, social, and biological parenthood can be conceptually distinguished; however, parenthood
is arguably fundamentally a moral relationship, and its moral assignment should be considering in
answering the preceding questions. Moral parenthood is possession of moral parental rights and
responsibilities. These may differ in content from legal rights and responsibilities—we might think
parents morally ought to do more than they are legally required, for example. The moral grounds
for assigning parental rights can also differ from their legal assignment. Of course, legal assignment
of parenthood may trigger moral obligations, due to a general moral obligation to obey the law or
because the legal parent is best-placed to rear the child. But moral theories of parenthood give
independent grounds for parental rights from the standpoint of which particular legal arrangements
may be criticized.

The interrelation of legal, moral, social, and biological parenthood depends on the particular moral
theory of how one becomes a parent. For example, on a genetic account, biology determines moral
parental status, whereas on an intentional account, biology will be less morally salient. Section 4
reviews these theories.

2. Procreative Autonomy
20th-century international human rights documents explicitly codify the right “to marry and found
a family” (United Nations 1948, Article 16), and thus some writers argue that liberal constitutions
implicitly enshrine a right to procreate (Hill 1991). A right to procreate, or procreative autonomy,
could be construed as a negative or positive right. As a negative right, it would be a right against
coercive interference in decisions regarding procreation. As a positive right, it would be an
entitlement to assistance in procreation.

This entry does not consider abortion. Although positions on procreative autonomy are not
independent of positions on abortion, the extensive philosophical debate about abortion must be
dealt with independently. The issue of contraception can be touched on briefly here. While some
religious views oppose contraception, this position is not widely defended in philosophical ethics.
However, philosophical debate has recently emerged over “conscientious objections” by
pharmacists. In some jurisdictions, pharmacists opposing abortion have a legal right to refuse to
dispense emergency contraception, on the (medically controversial) grounds that it acts as an
abortifacient. This right has been defended on the grounds that pharmacists' freedom of conscience
outweighs mere inconvenience to women (if they can obtain the drug elsewhere). But others have
argued that such refusals constitute serious harms to women, not mere inconveniences, and that
similar objections would not be permitted in non-procreative cases, such as a vegetarian pharmacist
who refused to dispense materials tested on animals (LaFollette and LaFollette 2007; Fenton and
Lomasky 2005; McLeod 2010; Kelleher 2010).

2.1 Grounds and limits of a right to procreate

A negative moral right to procreate may be grounded in autonomy rights to control one's body and
make certain important decisions for oneself (Dworkin 1993). Violations could involve direct
physical coercion such as rape or forced abortion or sterilization, or coercive interference with
decisions regarding sexual activity or contraception. Involuntary physical interventions such as
forced contraception, sterilization, or abortion were practiced in twentieth-century eugenic
movements. Their wrongness is now generally acknowledged, but critics see continuity between
such policies and contemporary moderately coercive policies such as making contraceptive
implants the condition of medical aid for impoverished women (see Moskowitz and Jennings
1996).

A right to procreate may also be grounded in the strong interest people have in creating a child,
giving birth, and parenting (Robertson 1994). Because this justification does not concern a right to
use one's body, but to realize the important interest in creating and rearing a child, it implies a
positive (as well as negative) right to procreate, most often understood as entailing a right to access
ART (Robertson 1994, 2004–05). Such a positive right could also entail a claim to sufficient
environmental resources to raise children justly (Gheaus 2016) or to funding for ART - however,
a distinct right to parent could be met through adoption, perhaps justifying financial barriers to
ART where children are available for adoption (De Wispelaere and Weinstock 2014).

Arguably, the right to procreate is limited, as other rights are limited, by the threat of harm to
others. Benatar argues, for example, that autonomy rights cannot permit risking severe harm to
children; those who risk transmitting HIV, for instance, cannot assert a right to reproduce. While
the moral costs of forced abortion or sterilization are “immense,” the moral costs of moderate
coercion or directive counseling should be weighed against the moral costs of harm to future
children (Benatar 2010, 94). One rejoinder is to ask whether the proposed coercion, counseling, or
penalties are consistently extended to all behavior harmful to potential children, or whether drug-
addicted and poor women are singled out, betraying a non-medical bias (Hausman 2006).

Some philosophers argue for limiting the moral right to procreate to married or long-term male-
female couples on harm-based grounds (Almond 2006). Some claim that same-sex and single
parenting harm children. While the wealth of debate cannot be addressed here, there seems to be a
lack of evidence that same-sex parenting harms children (for diverse views, see Nussbaum and
Estlund 1997, Part IV). Since evidence suggests that divorce can harm children, such arguments
risk inconsistency if not applied to male-female couples at risk of divorce or sub-par parenting.
Another argument suggests the moral right to procreate is burdened by a non-anonymity condition.
Velleman argues that procreation using anonymous gamete providers is wrong because it frustrates
children's interest in knowing their genetic forebears (Velleman 2005). But not only would this
make certain forms of adoption morally suspect, it presupposes implausible connection between
genetics, identity, and human flourishing (Haslanger 2009).

A second set of objections to the unburdened exercise of procreative autonomy is anti-natalist.

Anti-natalism is opposition to procreation; in its local form it applies only to particular people in
certain instances, in its global form, to everyone. A local anti-natalist holds that prospective parents
who believe they will not be sufficiently competent should not procreate (Cassidy 2006). Local
anti-natalism is also supported by the judgment that wrongful birth, birth which wrongfully
imposes undue risk and harm on a resulting child, is possible (Shiffrin 1999). Global anti-natalism
opposes procreation in general. One global anti-natalist position holds that in all cases procreation
is a harm to those brought into being. Benatar argues that while existence brings pains as well as
pleasures, non-existence is a lack of pains and pleasures. While pain is bad, absence of pain and
pleasure is not bad, so it is always worse to be than not to be (Benatar 1997, 2006; see also
discussion of Shiffrin 1999, below; for a response, see Overall 2012). Other global anti-natalist
positions focus on harms or costs to others. An environmentalist anti-natalism argues that
procreation is wrong for the same reasons overconsumption is (Young 2001, MacIver 2015). An
opportunity-cost anti-natalism argues that the money spent on rearing a child would be better spent
on ameliorating the lives of those already existing (Rachels 2014). And a misanthropic anti-
natalism argues that humans cause so much harm - to other humans, non-human animals, and the
environment - that there is a duty not to procreate (Benatar 2015). Others have argued that the
availability of children needing homes creates strong moral reasons to adopt rather than to procreate
(Friedrich 2013, Rulli 2014a). Anti-natalists, however, do not always defend legal restrictions,
because interfering with procreation may involve intolerably illiberal coercion of the person. One
response to anti-natalist views is to provide a justification for the decision to procreate. Some
authors, agreeing that procreation requires a justification and that many common reasons for
procreating carry no moral weight, locate a possible justification in the unique nature of the parent-
child relationship, the desire for pregnancy, or the desire to pass on valuable family traits (Overall
2012, Rulli 2014b, Brake 2015; on whether one can make a rational decision to have a child, see
Paul 2015 and Krishnamurthy 2015).

While harm to identifiable others is generally agreed upon as a constraint on the morality of
procreation, various views would constrain a right to procreate even further. In the following
sections we consider communitarian conservative, liberal, and feminist approaches to procreative
liberty.

2.2 Communitarian conservative perspectives on procreative autonomy

Communitarian conservative approaches to procreative liberty tend to regard procreation as part

of a dense web of practices that gain their meaning and value from being part of a comprehensive
way of life. Efforts to increase procreative autonomy—particularly through biotechnology—risk
meddling with such ways of life (Sandel 2007). Thus, communitarian conservatives view ART
with suspicion. The 20th-century record of Nazi “eugenics” programs, forced abortion as a
population-control mechanism, and widespread nonconsensual sterilization in many countries,
including the United States, is adduced as support for pessimism about technological, policy-
driven, or self-indulgent interventions in procreation (Meilaender 1987).

Communitarian conservatives typically oppose the use of ART. They also criticize talk of rights in
discussion of procreation and parent-child relations. As Murray writes: “Procreative liberty's
problems began when it appropriated the abstract principle—the right to choose—and ripped it out
of the rich context that provided its moral heft” (Murray 2002, 42).

Communitarian conservatives need not deny that persons have a strong interest in autonomy
regarding procreative decisions. The point is that this interest is both generated and delimited by a
particular communal context. They believe there is no right to reproductive autonomy, because
reproductive choices gain their meaning and value from this context.
2.3 Liberal perspectives on procreative autonomy

Liberal theory has generated two distinct positions on procreative autonomy. The “repro-
libertarian” approach opposes regulations on reproductive decisions and ART unless they can be
shown to threaten harm to others. Repro-libertarianism is grounded in the values of individual
equality and autonomy (Feinberg 1986; Dworkin 1993). The basic thought is that interfering in
procreation involves illiberal interference with the person and her choices. Further, some authors
hold that ART ought to be universally available provided it does not harm others, because any
restrictions would constitute unequal treatment of those who cannot conceive through sexual
intercourse (whether due to infertility or because they do not form a “traditional” family) (Harris
1998).

Repro-libertarians have been concerned to show that assumptions about the inherent wrongness or
harmfulness of ART are not justified. In particular, they have argued that conservative opposition
to cloning, genetic selection, surrogacy, and harvesting fetal ovarian tissue is based in undefended
traditionalism (Harris 1998; cf. Glover 1998; Buchanan et al. 2000, chap. 2).

Many liberals move beyond a focus on individual liberty to consider broader effects of reproductive
policy. Such “policy liberals” share values of autonomy and equality with repro-libertarians, and
as a result treat market exchanges and consensual services as “innocent until proven guilty.” But
while repro-libertarians focus on the effects of particular procreative choices, policy liberals also
attend to the impact of institutionalizing practices such as genetic selection, or IVF, within a society
that aims to maintain liberal background institutions (Glover et al. 1989; Buchanan et al. 2000;
Brock 2005). Institutionalization foregrounds concerns that liberals focused on individual choices
downplay, such as the effects of large numbers, the incentives that policies create, and opportunity
costs. Thus for policy liberals it will be impossible to determine the scope of procreative rights
without considering institutional structure, given reasonable assumptions about human
motivations.

For instance, when many people make similar reproductive choices, the resulting “baby boom”
may reshape the social, economic, political, and environmental landscape. Similarly, sex ratios
might become grossly skewed in countries with a strong preference for male children. Such
concerns might provide grounds for restricting ARTs or incentivizing their use. Similarly,
arguments for incentivizing procreation within marriage assume that children reared within
marriages will benefit as contrasted with those reared outside marriages (Galston 1991, chap. 10;
but see Young 1995).

Policy liberal accounts of procreative autonomy may face problems in a context of social inequality
and over-population. Some affirm procreative autonomy, but regard it as compatible with
apparently coercive population policies such as limitations on the number of children particular
persons may have. This may be because they regard procreative autonomy as a merely prima facie
right, less weighty than other rights, such as the right to a minimally decent quality of life (Bayles
1979). Or they may regard procreative autonomy more narrowly than is commonly done (O'Neill
1979; Hill 1991; Floyd & Pomerantz 1981). O'Neill, for example, construes procreative autonomy
as requiring an intention to rear the resulting child so that it has a life at least normal for its society.
Without such intentions, parents are not exercising a right to procreate, and thus policies to curtail
their behavior do not constitute coercive infringements of procreative autonomy.

In conclusion, policy liberals hold that procreative autonomy is one among many important forms
of autonomy, which may conflict among themselves, and with the state's legitimate (or
compulsory) ends such as the provision of public goods and compliance with national constitutions.
Talk of rights, from such a standpoint, is appropriate only within a nexus of liberties, claims,
powers, and ends. From such a perspective, the implications of a right to procreative autonomy are
much less straightforward than from the individually focused repro-libertarian perspective.

2.4 Feminist perspectives on procreative autonomy

The final major perspective on procreative autonomy includes various views that share a feminist
commitment to opposing patriarchy and promoting people's (particularly women's) abilities to
determine the shape of their own lives, where this includes sexual and reproductive autonomy.
While feminists can be found in each of the previous schools, many feminists criticize them.

The feminist concern to enable women to control their own lives and bodies suggests sympathy
with the repro-libertarians' focus on autonomy and equality. But unlike liberals, many feminists are
skeptical of the reproductive biotechnology establishment, which remains preponderantly white,
upper-middle class, male, and corporate. Hence feminists often charge that repro-libertarianism
would exacerbate existing power inequalities (Corea 1985, 1988; Rothman 1989; Dodds and Jones
1989a). While this establishment represents itself as empowering women, many feminists charge
that it succeeds only in disempowering them: it conscripts poorer women into service for people
who are usually wealthier; it creates new expectations that may subtly coerce women to pursue
fertility treatments or other medical interventions; and it inevitably reflects the cultural, economic,
sexist, and racist biases of the society at large (Brazier 1998).

Some feminist writers have also raised the concern that any putative right to procreate threatens to
give men power over women. In addition to empowering the mostly male scientific establishment,
a right to procreate could empower a man to prevent his erstwhile partner from aborting her
pregnancy (Overall 1993). Thus the importance of a right not to procreate has led many feminists
to place the various strands of procreative autonomy within a nexus of interests.

Critiques of the concept of procreative autonomy as misleading or empty rhetoric reflect a larger
feminist project critical of autonomy construed as individual choice: within an inegalitarian social
and economic system, some feminists argue, pressures on choice will ensure that supposedly free
choices disadvantage women. This is particularly problematic when the medical establishment
presents burdensome technologies as the expected norm. Choices are shaped by the salient
alternatives, so that the widespread adoption of new medical technologies will affect women's
choices (as the normalization of testing for Downs' syndrome shapes women's choice to undergo
such testing). The point is not that adopting new technology is always problematic, but that the
repro-libertarian framework for evaluating it is naïve and misleading (Sherwin 1992).

A further feminist concern is that the rhetoric surrounding reproductive biotechnology

commodifies women's bodies, devalues women's role in reproduction, and treats women as mere
means rather than ends in themselves. For instance, some reproductive services entail so-called
“womb rental,” “egg harvesting,” or “surrogate motherhood” (Rothman 1989; Ber 2000). Feminists
such as Corea argue that the reproductive biotechnology establishment relies on a distorted and
stereotyped picture of the nature, desires, and needs of women, as well as the success rate of the
technologies it purveys, and that these technologies result in physical harms to women (Corea
1985; Brazier 1998).

Finally, by conceptualizing women and their fetuses or newborns as having conflicting interests,
rather than as in symbiotic harmony (as they usually are), the medical establishment promotes an
adversarial view which lends itself to overriding pregnant women's treatment decisions. Such
interventions, such as court-ordered C-sections, are especially problematic when similar
interventions would not be imposed on parents to save a born child's life (such as a court-ordered
blood transfusion); this inconsistency suggests a bias against pregnant women's decision-making
capacity. Understandings of pregnancy and motherhood, feminists argue, need to be enriched by
considering women's experience of pregnancy and moving away from an antagonistic medical
model, as well as appreciating how that model has been socially constructed (Purdy 1990; Kukla
2005; Mullin 2005).

3. The Morality of Procreation

For the most part, secular debates about the morality of procreation focus on whether and when
procreation is impermissible, rather than whether it might be obligatory (though see Smilansky
1995 and Gheaus 2015 on whether there could be a duty to procreate). The debates concerning the
impermissibility of procreation raise deep issues in metaphysics and value theory (Belshaw 2003;
Holtug 2001; Kavka 1982; Rachels 1998). We restrict our discussion to moral issues rather than
legal ones, and assume throughout that reproduction is fully voluntary and informed—that is,
neither coerced nor accidental.

3.1 Direct and indirect personal interests

We can distinguish three kinds of considerations at stake in reproductive decisions: direct personal
interests, indirect personal interests, and impersonal considerations. Direct personal interests are
the interests of the child that would be created following the reproductive decision. These come
into play with particular urgency when the child would experience a life so miserable as to be not
worth living. Whether there are such lives—and if so, what characterizes them—is controversial,
but it is not unreasonable to suppose that a life can be so irremediably miserable that it is of no
benefit to the individual who endures it. Arguably, the lives of those born with Tay-Sachs disease
fit this description, and many argue that it is immoral to knowingly bring such children into the
world. However, some authors go much further than this, arguing that procreating is wrong unless
the parent has reason to think he or she can provide the child with a good chance of a normal life.
The general claim is that certain types of individuals have an interest in not being brought into
existence on account of the quality of life they would have were they created (McMahon 1998;
Roberts 1998).

Indirect personal interests are the interests of those affected by the creation of the child, other than
the child her- or himself. For example, in societies in which the state provides health care and
education each new child represents a cost to the existing members of society, as well as a
potentially useful member of the workforce and community later in life (see Section 5.2). The
justification for compulsory schooling may take into account the substantial public goods generated
by an educated citizenry, and the herd immunity effects of vaccination may comprise part of the
justification for requiring children to be vaccinated. Indirect personal interests are widely held to
have a bearing on the morality of reproduction, but a general account of their impact on
reproductive deliberation would be complex and highly nuanced. Brock (2005) provides a valuable
overview (albeit with a policy focus) of limitations based on “the protection of others from harm,”
“the protection of public goods,” and the “prevention of social harms.”

3.2 The Non-Identity Problem and Impersonal Considerations

It might be hoped that we could give a full account of permissible reproduction by appealing to
only direct and indirect personal interests. Unfortunately, there is reason to think that this may not
be possible. Consider the following sort of case, introduced into the literature by Parfit (1984), and
known as the non-identity problem (Hanser 1990; Harman 2004; Woodward 1986; entry on the
nonidentity problem):

Marie is taking a drug that she knows will cause a birth defect—say, a withered arm—in any child
that she conceives (call this child “Amy”). In 3 months this drug will have passed from her body,
and she will be able to conceive a child free from this defect (call this child “Sophie”). Intuitively,
Marie does something wrong in deciding to have Amy rather than Sophie.

Non-identity cases of this kind are called “same-number” cases because they involve comparing
situations that contain the same number of individuals. Other versions of the non-identity problem
involve different-number (or non-comparative) choices:

Sally has a genetic condition that she knows will cause any child she conceives to be born with a
serious cognitive disability. Despite knowing this fact, Sally deliberately conceives and gives birth
to a seriously cognitively disabled child, George.

Assume, plausibly, that Amy and George have lives that are worth living. Does Marie do something
wrong in conceiving and giving birth to Amy? Does Sally do something wrong conceiving and
giving birth to George? Many are inclined to think that they do, but it is unclear how we can capture
this wrongness by appeal only to personal interests. This is because wronging someone seems to
presuppose that things could have gone otherwise for that individual—i.e., it seems to require talk
of direct personal interests—but things could not have gone otherwise for either Amy or George.
Sally's putative wrong consists in creating George, and doing otherwise would have entailed
creating no one. Her action has no victim and therefore sets back no one's interests. Amy isn't made
worse off by Marie's actions, for had Marie waited another three months before conceiving she
would have given birth to a different child (Sophie) instead of Amy. It is therefore difficult to see
how Marie might have harmed or wronged Amy.

It is also prima facie implausible that indirect personal interests explain why these actions would
be wrong: they are wanted and their births don't harm their community.
The non-identity problem is not solely a problem for the morality of procreation. Anyone who
affects the welfare of future people in identity-affecting ways may face it. Readers interested in
general approaches to the non-identity problem should consult the relevant entry. Here we discuss
just those aspects bearing on the ethics of becoming parents (see also Hanser 1990; Vehmas 2002).

Feinberg (1992) compares situations like the Marie and Sally cases with cases in which someone
is harmed in the course of being saved from a greater harm (e.g., his leg is broken while his life is
being saved). In both cases an evil or harm is justified in virtue of the fact that it is a necessary
condition of a greater good—in the one case saving a person's life, in the other case bringing a life
into existence. Shiffrin (1999), however, holds that harming someone to save them from a greater
harm is morally distinct from harming them to impose a “pure benefit” on them. Shiffrin claims
that we have serious qualms about harming someone without their consent to secure a pure benefit
for them, even when we can be sure that they would regard the pure benefit as far outweighing the
harm (see also Steinbock and McClamrock 1994). She concludes that procreation is routinely more
morally problematic than is generally recognized.

Shiffrin's attempt to drive a wedge into Feinberg's analogy raises questions of its own. First, one
might challenge the assumption that life is a pure benefit. Even if we assume that Amy's life would
be worth living, creating her would be a benefit only on a rather peculiar conception of what a
“benefit” entails. Amy is not better off than she otherwise would have been, for there is no way
that she otherwise would have been. Furthermore, the argument may prove too much. If one is
never justified in harming someone (without their consent) to impose a pure benefit on them, and
if existence always involves some form of harm, then it must always be wrong to bring someone
into existence. A global form of anti-natalism (see Section 2.1) thereby seems to be the price of
this solution to the non-identity problem.

A number of authors, including Parfit, argue that we need to appeal to impersonal considerations
to solve the non-identity problem. Several of these solutions appeal to the role morality of parents.
According to Freeman, “The principle of parental responsibility requires that individuals should
desist from having children unless certain minimum conditions can be satisfied. Responsible
parents want their children to have good and fulfilling lives” (1997, 180). Freeman goes on to claim
that the principle of parental responsibility entails that the very young and very old should not
become parents. Similarly, Purdy claims that one shouldn't reproduce unless one can ensure that
one's children will have a decent life, with clean water, nutritious food, shelter, education, and
medical care counting as basic prerequisites (Purdy 1995). Purdy's position seems to imply that
many—even most—of the world's children have been wrongly brought into existence. More
recently, Wasserman has argued that whether it is permissible to bring a child into existence with
certain characteristics (such as impairments), depends on the reasons the prospective parents have
for creating such a child. These should be reasons that concern the good of the child (Wasserman
2005).

Not all of those who have written on the non-identity problem accept that Marie does wrong in
deciding to have Amy rather than Sophie, or that Sally does wrong in reproducing. Indeed, some
find the suggestion that it is wrong to (knowingly) bring disabled children into the world abhorrent
due to the implications of such views for individuals with disabilities. Asch holds that a woman
has a right to an abortion, but also that it would be wrong to have an abortion to prevent the birth
of a disabled child. Abortion on such grounds is immoral, she argues, because it communicates that
“disability is so terrible it warrants not being alive” (Asch 1999, 387). The argument could easily
be extended to decisions about whether to conceive a certain type of child. Does prenatal diagnosis
and selective abortion, or preimplantation genetic diagnosis, communicate that disability is so
terrible it warrants not being alive? On its face this claim is contestable; the associated decisions
are highly specific to each case. And even if such acts did communicate something, it is unclear
that it would be a thesis about relative qualities of life (see also Buchanan et al. 2000, chap. 7). For
more discussion of the ethics of creating people with disabilities see encyclopedia article on
disability: health, well-being, and personal relationships.

3.3 Assisted Reproduction

Suppose that competent adults have the liberty to procreate. Are there limits on the means that they
may take in order to do so? In this and the following section we focus on three methods of ART
that have generated controversy: gamete donation, in vitro fertilization (IVF), and commercial
surrogacy. Most discussion has centered on whether it is permissible for prospective parents to
avail themselves of these novel technologies for procreation. We might also ask whether people
have a claim to access these technologies through public health care systems or private health
insurance. Most rich countries with universal health care provide some treatment for infertility. For
example, the United Kingdom's National Health Service funds a limited number of cycles of IVF
for couples who meet eligibility criteria. Given limited resources, providing ART takes away from
money that could be spent on other health care interventions. In this context it is particularly
important whether infertility is properly considered a disease or disability in need of treatment.

Gamete donation involves the provision of gametes by a man or woman who is not intended to be
the resulting child's social parent. Insemination by another man is not a new technology per se, but
the modern phenomena of sperm banking and anonymous providers have led some to question the
morality of artificial insemination by donor (AID). Some objections clearly have a religious basis;
we therefore do not discuss them here. Repro-conservatives have also developed secular objections
to gamete donation by both sexes. The most interesting of these focuses on the practice of paying
gamete providers. For example, Thomas Murray criticizes “insemination by vendor” on the
grounds that it inserts the values of the marketplace into family life and thereby threatens to
undermine it (Murray 1996, 34). The process of harvesting ova also involves serious risks to the
woman providing them, which are discussed in the description of the IVF process below.

A different set of concerns centers on the moral responsibilities of gamete providers. Since in most
jurisdictions gamete providers must waive all parental claims over their genetic offspring, it has
been widely assumed that they do not have moral parental responsibilities. Several philosophers
have, however, argued that gamete donation is morally dubious, precisely because providers take
their parental responsibilities too lightly (Benatar 1999; Nelson 1991). The argument can be
challenged in at least two ways. First, we might challenge the claim that gamete providers typically
treat their parental responsibilities too lightly by transferring or alienating them (Bayne 2003, Page
1985), especially in the case when gamete donation occurs in a context in which assisted
reproduction is regulated and would-be gamete recipients are screened. Second, one could argue
that in the broad nexus of persons responsible for creating a child through assisted reproduction,
the contribution of gamete providers is not especially morally significant (Fuscaldo 2006).
IVF involves fertilizing ova outside the womb and transferring resulting embryos into the uterus.
The woman whose ova are used is given a hormone treatment that induces producing multiple ova,
which are harvested by a needle inserted through the vaginal wall. Fertilization may involve
incubating the ovum in sperm or injecting a single sperm into the ovum in intracytoplasmic sperm
injection (ICSI). Several embryos are transferred into the uterus after three to five days. Since the
birth of the first “test-tube baby” in 1978, IVF has become a fairly common procedure for
addressing certain forms of infertility.

Objections to IVF have focused on negative consequences for the women or their offspring and on
wider societal implications. Stimulation of the ovaries may lead to ovarian hyperstimulation
syndrome, a potentially serious condition. Like any surgical procedure there are risks involved in
retrieval of ova. Transferring multiple embryos increases risk of multiple pregnancy, which can be
risky for both mother and fetuses. Fetuses born as a result of IVF may be at an increased risk of
birth defects, lower birth weights, and premature birth (Bower and Hansen 2005; Reefhuis et al.
2009). The absolute risk of these problems remains relatively low, however, and so they do not
seem to justify a blanket prohibition on IVF.

Similar objections to those raised against gamete donation have also been raised against IVF,
including that it commodifies children and female reproduction. Feminists have developed a more
subtle critique. Sherwin (1987) argues that the powerful desires that many people, especially
women, have for their own biological children are the product of problematic social arrangements
and cultural values. While reproductive technologies like IVF may help some (privileged) women
get what they want, they also further entrench the oppressive societal values that create these
powerful desires in the first place.

IVF typically results in creating more embryos than are used in the fertility treatment. The
remaining embryos may be given to other women for implantation, donated for research, destroyed,
or cryogenically stored. A 2003 study estimated that there are 400,000 cryogenically stored
embryos in the United States (Hoffman et al. 2003). Depending on one's view of the moral
importance of human embryos this may be considered an especially worrying consequence of IVF.
People who believe that such embryos have the same moral status as humans will judge that
destroying them is wrong and creating them without a plan for implantation is comparably bad.
The use of surplus embryos as a source of totipotent stem cells for medical research has generated
objections from religious groups and conservatives opposed to abortion. Consistency would seem
to require that anyone who objects to using these embryos in research ought also to object to their
creation in the first place, since it almost inevitably results in surplus embryos that will eventually
be destroyed.

3.4 Surrogacy and Contractually Assisted Reproduction

Perhaps the most controversial form of assisted reproduction is so-called “surrogate” motherhood.
Surrogacy arrangements can take many forms, but the most widely discussed involves two parties,
a contracting couple and a “surrogate” or gestational mother. Typically in return for payment, the
gestational mother carries a child derived from the gametes of one or both members of the
contracting couple and agrees to give the child over to the couple after birth.
Many of the disputes surrounding surrogacy focus on the question of who should be given parental
rights and responsibilities if the arrangement breaks down. (In some cases, neither party to the
arrangement wants to keep the baby; in other cases both parties want to keep it.) Indeed, much of
the impetus for recent accounts of the grounds of parenthood has derived from attempts to
adjudicate such disputes (section 4).

Repro-libertarians insist that a right to procreative autonomy entails protecting most methods of
“collaborative reproduction,” so long as they are safe and consensual (Robertson 1994, chap. 6).
For them, the right to procreate is a special case of the right to make binding contracts. But it is not
settled whether such contracts ought to be legal and, if so, enforceable. One central point of
contention is whether gestational surrogacy involves commodification—for example, by entailing
that the gestational mother is selling her baby—or whether it is no different in kind from other
forms of paid childcare (Anderson 1990; Radin 1996; Glover et al. 1989; Shanley 1993; but see
also Arneson 1992). A further concern has to do with whether anyone who undertakes a contractual
obligation to surrender custody of future children can do so autonomously. Some writers argue that
such decisions cannot be autonomous, and hence that surrogacy contracts should not only be
unenforceable but also illegal (Dodds and Jones 1989b; see Purdy 1989 and Oakley 1992 for a
response). Others reject bans on surrogacy contracts as paternalistic but nevertheless urge that
safeguards should be in place, such as mandated post-natal waiting periods during which the
gestational mother is permitted to change her mind (Steinbock 1988).

Surrogacy is now regulated in most countries. Commercial surrogacy is widely, though not
universally, illegal. Many more jurisdictions permit so-called “altruistic” surrogacy, which do not
involve paying the surrogate mother over and above compensating her for direct costs. To what
extent this distinction actually matters morally is disputed (Anleu 1990).

3.5 Enhancement

Some couples who undergo IVF also opt for preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) whereby the
genomes of their embryos are analyzed and particular embryos then selected for implantation. This
is more common among couples at risk for transmitting a genetic disease or who are trying to create
a child compatible with an existing ill child so that she can be used as a source of donated stem
cells. However, it can be used for selecting for or against other traits, such as gender, or disability—
for example, some deaf parents want to raise children who inherit their deafness. Such uses of PGD
are controversial (on gender selection see Robertson 2003; Purdy 2007; Heyd 2003; on selecting
deafness see Karpin 2007).

Though current technology is mostly limited to selecting among existing embryos, the prospect of
genetically altering gametes or embryos has generated questions about the permissibility of genetic
enhancement.

Several recent critics of genetic enhancement argue that permitting enhancement is liable to
undermine important human values. Sandel argues that the control that enhancement technology
would allow parents is liable to undermine their humility in the face of the gift of their children,
impose responsibilities that we are not prepared to deal with, and threaten social solidarity (Sandel
2007). Habermas argues that parents who genetically enhance their children will, through the
control they exert, prevent their children from entering relationships of moral equality and
undermine their ability to be autonomous (Habermas 2003). Both have been criticized for
exaggerating the likely effects of permitting enhancement technologies (Fenton 2006; Lev 2011).

A second argument against permitting parents to genetically enhance their offspring is that it is
liable to exacerbate unfairness. Enhancements will probably be available only to richer parents. As
a result, their offspring, who are already advantaged over their peers, would be even better able to
compete against them (Etieyibo 2012).This is commonly raised as a particular objection to genetic
(or other biomedical) enhancements, but it is not clear why there is something distinctive about
genetic enhancement that renders it more troubling than other ways in which parents attempt to
enhance their children, such as private schooling.

The fairness objection also assumes that the advantages of genetic enhancement are competitive
advantages, so that an enhancement would make the recipient better able to compete with others
for goods such as careers and social status. This assumption underlies concerns both that the
availability of enhancements would exacerbate existing inequalities and that if universally
available they would be collectively self-defeating (as, for example, if everyone were to add 6
inches to their height) (Glannon 2001). However, this assumption might be false; for example,
literacy is a non-genetic enhancement which is beneficial both to the literate person and others
(Buchanan 2008).

While most discussions of the ethics of genetic enhancement have focused on whether the practice
is ever permissible, some ethicists argue that it is not only permissible for parents to enhance their
children, but a positive duty. Savulescu (2001) argues for what he calls the principle of Procreative
Beneficence: couples should use pre-genetic diagnosis and selective abortion to choose the child,
of the children they could have, who will have the best life. This naturally extends to using genetic
enhancement. Savulescu's justification for the principle of Procreative Beneficence is that it seems
irrational not to select the best child when no other reasons are relevant to one's choice. But this
seems like a very weak principle: it seems likely that at least some other reason will frequently
apply. For example, prospective parents might just prefer to leave their child's genetic makeup up
to chance. If this is not an irrational preference, then it plausibly gives some reason for them not to
select any particular embryo to implant. Savulescu's view is extended in further papers which claim
that the principle of Procreative Beneficence has greater moral weight than simply being a
tiebreaker when no other reasons apply (Savulescu and Kahane 2009, 281; for criticism see Parker
2010).

Finally, controversy is not limited to genetic interventions: there are live debates about whether
parents may choose (male) circumcision, clitoridectomy, marrow donation, sex assignment of
inter-sexed children, and other surgical interventions (see, e.g., Benatar and Benatar 2003 on
circumcision; Parens 2006, on surgically shaping children).

4. Becoming Parents
In virtue of what does one become a moral parent, i.e., a primary bearer of parental rights and/or
parental responsibilities with respect to a particular child? We can distinguish four general answers:
genetic, labor-based, intentional (or voluntarist), and causal accounts. On monistic versions, only
one of these properties generates parental relationships. On pluralistic accounts, more than one of
these relations can ground parenthood.

4.1 Genetic accounts

Genetic theories ground parenthood in the relation of direct genetic derivation. Geneticism thus
places parenthood in the nexus of other familial relations, such as being a sibling, cousin, and so
on, which appear to have a genetic basis.

Hall (1999) defends geneticism by appeal to the Lockean notion of self-ownership. Since genetic
parents own the genetic material from which the child is constituted, they have a prima facie
parental claim to the child. There are a number of problems with this line of argument (Kolers &
Bayne 2001) and it is an argument that Locke himself rejected (Franklin-Hall 2012). First, it
subsumes parental relations under property relations, by attempting to derive a claim about
parenthood from premises involving claims about ownership. The plausibility of this derivation is
based on emphasizing parental rights associated with exclusivity and authority, and downplaying
parental responsibilities. Those responsibilities—to both child and community—pull sharply
against a property-based analysis of parenthood. Second, taking self-ownership seriously entails
that children own themselves, and this surely defeats any proprietary claim that their parents might
have in them (Archard 1990). Third, genetic parents do not provide the material from which the
child is constituted in utero; that derives from the gestational mother, not the genetic parents (Silver
2001). Of course, the child's genetic make-up structures that matter, but to argue for the priority of
the genetic over the gestational contribution is to argue for the priority of form over matter, and it
is not obvious that this can be done.

Other arguments for geneticism derive from considering paternity, in that direct genetic derivation
appears to provide the most plausible account of the basis of fatherhood. Several recent legal cases
have overturned adoptions on the grounds that the estranged father, unidentified at the time of birth,
has returned to claim the child (Rosenman 1995, Shanley 1995). Supporters of these decisions
endorse the view that unalienated genetic claims to children can override months or even years of
rearing by the adoptive parents, as well as the earlier failure of the father to claim the child.
Similarly, in “surrogacy” cases, many writers have argued—or simply assumed—that a genetic
father may have his own child by contracting with a surrogate mother. This seems to presuppose a
genetic account of paternity; and it is a small step from a genetic account of paternity to a genetic
account of parenthood. One need appeal only to the principle of “parity,” according to which the
sort of relationship that makes one person a parent suffices to make anyone else a parent (Bayne &
Kolers 2003; Austin 2004).

4.2 Labor-based accounts

An alternative account views parents' work, rather than their genetic relationships, as essential to
the parental relation. According to these labor-based accounts, people who play or have played a
parental role in a child's life have thereby become the parents. In this spirit, a number of authors
have argued that the primary ground of parenthood is the gestational relation (Rothman 1989;
Feldman 1992). In reproductive contexts in which a child's gestational mother differs from its
genetic mother—as in egg (or embryo) donation and gestational surrogacy—it is therefore the
gestational mother who has the primary claim to parental rights and responsibilities. This line of
argument can be expanded to include people besides the gestational mother who have taken a
parental role in rearing a child (Millum 2010).

Two main considerations are presented in favor of labor-based accounts. One focuses on the
interests of the child. Where a child has been looked after by a person or people for some time, it
is thought to be very damaging for her to be taken away from them (Archard 2004). Likewise, in
the case of gestation, since the gestational mother is guaranteed to be identifiable at birth, it is in
the best interests of the child that she be regarded as the mother (Annas 1984). However, while
recognizing the gestational mother or caregivers as parents will sometimes serve the best interests
of the child, it is implausible that this will always be the case. This argument might, at best, ground
laws presuming that the gestational mother and rearing parents have a claim to be the legal parents.
Since there will likely be cases in which being reared by someone else would be better for the child,
it will be difficult to justify the assignment of parenthood on the grounds of labor in every case.

A second line of argument appeals to what parents deserve for the work they do. Gestational
mothers typically invest a substantial amount of effort into the child. In Narayan's words, a
gestational mother typically undergoes “considerable discomfort, effort, and risk in the course of
pregnancy and childbirth” (Narayan 1999, 81; also Gheaus 2012). While this account appears to
give a special role to gestational mothers, it can include parenting partners who help bear the costs
or contribute to establishing a relationship (for example, by viewing an ultrasound image together).
Similarly, the people who care for a child invest a great deal of work. It might therefore be thought
that they deserve to be the parents (Millum 2010).

Labor-based accounts have the advantage over genetic accounts that they can explain why the
individuals they pick out as the parents ought to have parental rights. They also incorporate
adoptive and other non-biological parental relationships into a single account of parenthood,
whereas genetic accounts seem forced to view non-biological parenthood as a distinct type of
normative relationship. Objections to gestationalist accounts of parenthood may start from the
problem of paternity: if gestation is necessary for parenthood, how can men become fathers (Bayne
& Kolers 2003)? Broader labor-based accounts that count the work of other caregivers can explain
fatherhood, but they still seem to give the gestational mother veto power over other potential
parents. As Barbara Katz Rothman puts it: “if men want to have children, they will either have to
develop the technology that enables them to become pregnant … or have children through their
relationships with women” (Rothman 1989, 257). Some will find this implausible.

4.3 Intentional and voluntarist accounts

A third approach to parenthood, popular with legal theorists, appeals to intentions as the ground of
parenthood (Hill 1991; Parker 1982; Shultz 1990; Stumpf 1986). Intentionalists motivate their
position by appeal to cases like the following. The Khans wish to have a child “of their own.” They
screen egg and sperm providers and find providers who satisfy their requirements. They then select
a gestational mother, who carries the fetus to term and then hands the infant over to the Khans.
Intentionalists argue that because they “carefully and intentionally orchestrated the procreational
act, bringing together all the necessary components with the intention of creating a unique
individual whom they intend to raise as their own” (Hill 1991, 359), the Khans should be regarded
as the child's sole parents.

Another argument for intentionalism appeals to the “case of the misplaced sperm”:

Bruce is about to undergo some risky medical treatment, and has placed some of his sperm in a
sperm-bank in case he needs it at a later date. Through a bureaucratic mishap, Bruce's sperm is
swapped with that of a sperm-donor and is used by Bessie to produce a child. Does Bruce acquire
parental rights and responsibilities over Bessie's child?

Intuitions vary here, but there is at least some pull towards denying that Bruce's genetic relation to
Bessie's child gives him any parental claim over it. The reason Bruce lacks a parental relation to
Bessie's child seems to be that he didn't intentionally bring the child into existence.

Intentionalism construes parenthood as relying on facts about agency rather than biology; for the
intentionalist, parenthood is fundamentally a moral relationship rather than a biological one (see
Fuscaldo 2006, for discussion). Some philosophical defenses of intentionalism appeal to a
voluntaristic account of responsibilities in general (Van Zyl 2002). If special obligations to
particular others are generally acquired voluntarily, then it is plausible that parental obligations are
also voluntarily incurred (O'Neill 1979; Brake 2005, 2010; for criticism see Prusak 2011a, b).
Furthermore, parental obligations are role obligations. While it is a matter of debate whether any
role obligations can be acquired involuntarily, it is at least plausible that roles assumed as adults
(as opposed to roles one is born into) require voluntary acceptance. Finally, parental role
obligations are conventional: their scope and content varies by jurisdiction and society (Thompson
2005). This suggests an unfairness if such extensive obligations are incurred involuntarily (Brake
2010). On the other hand, once it is recognized that parental obligations are conventional, the
content of parental obligations and the voluntary actions required to acquire them can be explained
with reference to social conventions of parenthood (Millum 2008). Another defense of
intentionalism appeals to parental autonomy, as opposed to the way in which obligations are
incurred: Richards argues for a variant of the intentional view according to which parental rights
derive from “a right to continue [projects] we have underway” (Richards 2010, 23).

One objection to intentionalism concerns the content of the intentions that are supposed to ground
parenthood. Consider a case in which a couple conceives by accident and then form intentions to
give up the baby for adoption rather than rear it. This intention endures until 15 minutes after birth,
at which point they change their minds and decide to rear the child. It is highly implausible that for
the first 15 minutes of the child's life they are no more its parents than anyone else.

Perhaps the most widespread objection to the voluntarist account is that it seems to absolve
unintending procreators from parental obligation. However, many share the view that procreators,
intending or not, who voluntarily engaged in sex have a moral responsibility to a resulting child
due to their role in causing it to exist (Austin 2007; Fuscaldo 2006; Millum 2008).

Whatever the prospects of a voluntarist account of parenthood, a voluntarist account of familial

relations in general is implausible. The duties that siblings have to each other, or that children have
to their parents, are not easily understood as voluntary undertakings. This is a problem for
voluntarist accounts of parenthood to the extent that duties between parents and children should fit
within a wider framework of familial duties (Rachels 1989; Mills 2003; see Mullin 2010, for
discussion; and the entry on special obligations).

4.4 Causal accounts

Finally, parenthood may be grounded in causation (Nelson 1991; Bigelow et al. 1988; Blustein
1997; Archard 2010). A causal account differs from intentionalism in that one can cause something
without intending to do so. Indeed, one can cause a certain state of affairs even when one is unaware
that one's actions could do so. One needn't have grasped the connection between sexual intercourse
and pregnancy in order to be the cause of a child's existence.

One of the attractions of causalism is its promise to account for the plausibility of genetic, labor-
based, and intentional accounts of parenthood. Genetic, gestational, and caregiving relationships
contribute to the child's existence or development, and, in the cases that some intentionalists appeal
to, the commissioning couple are a cause of the child's existence. Causalism offers to explain its
competitors.

But causal accounts face problems: first, what is meant by “causation” in this context? ‘But-for’
causation is too weak to ground parenthood, because its scope is so wide: for example, procreation
might not have occurred ‘but-for’ the urgings of would-be grandparents or the actions of the match-
making friend who introduced the parents. But it is unclear what notion of causation the causal
theorist should adopt instead of ‘but-for’ causation (Blustein 1997). Second, what implications
does the causal account have? Even with a satisfactory account of causation it may be unclear
whom the account ascribes parenthood to in any particular case—or if it is clear enough, there is a
risk of an ad hoc account of causation tailor-made for this purpose. Concern with the arbitrariness
of the causal chain by means of which a child may be created leads writers such as Fuscaldo (2006)
to emphasize that what is wanted is not a theory of causation but of agency (see also Austin 2004,
2007). This leads back in the direction of intentionalism.

A related problem is that causal accounts often leave it unclear how causal responsibility generates
moral responsibility. Sometimes it appears that the thought is that procreators, by causing a child
to exist, have placed it in a needy position and so owe it, as compensation, “procreative costs.” But
these costs are arguably not equivalent to the weighty responsibilities of parenthood (Brake 2010).
The question is whether, as a result of causal responsibility for their existence, parents merely owe
children repair of their needy condition, by fostering survival to adulthood, or whether such
“procreative costs” include a richer set of parental responsibilities, such as a duty to love and to
make the child “content with his condition” (Prusak 2011b, 67).

One final alternative, as noted above, is a ‘pluralist’ account which allows that more than one of
these relations (such as causation or intention) may be sufficient, but not necessary, for parenthood
(Bayne and Kolers 2003). Pluralist accounts have not yet been developed in depth.

Having outlined the main theories of the grounds of parenthood, we turn now to questions
concerning the morality of being a parent.

5. Being Parents
Most contemporary discussions assume that moral parental rights and responsibilities or
obligations are inseparable (Bayne and Kolers 2003). But Archard has argued that this “parental
package” view is untenable (Archard and Benatar 2010, 22–25; Archard 2010; see Austin 2007,
chap. 3). To take Archard's example, an estranged, abusive parent may have moral and legal
support obligations but no parental rights; obligations to ensure a child is provided for do not entail
parental rights. It is more plausible, as Archard notes, that parental rights and responsibilities—
which, as contrasted with obligations, concern the hands-on, day-to-day rearing of the child—come
together. Even these, in some circumstances, might come apart—as when an estranged parent
retains some decision-making rights but holds no responsibilities.

5.1 Parental Rights

Parents have moral and legal rights regarding their children. They have the liberty to make
decisions on behalf of their children regarding matters such as diet, schooling, association with
others, and—controversially—religious observance, and the right to exclude others from such
decision-making. Such rights decrease in strength and scope as children gain decision-making
capacity, yet until the child reaches moral or legal competence, issues of substituted judgment and
surrogate decision-making remain (Ross 2002).

Parental rights' content, extent, and relation to parental obligations is determined by the underlying
theory of why parents possess such rights. On the child-centered or fiduciary model, parental rights
piggyback on parental responsibilities to children, which are morally fundamental. One such theory
is Blustein's “priority thesis.” According to the priority thesis, parents acquire rights in order to
carry out their responsibilities; thus responsibilities are morally prior to rights (Blustein 1982, 104–
114). As Archard writes, “A parent can choose for his child, and exclude others from the making
of these choices, only in the service of and thus constrained by a duty to care for the child. It is in
the first instance because a dependent child must have decisions made for it that a designated parent
is entitled to make those decisions.” (Archard 2010, 108; see also Brennan and Noggle 1997;
Austin 2007)

Other theories of parental rights focus on parents' interests. Historically, parenthood has often been
regarded as a possessory (or proprietary) relationship. Some genetic accounts of parenthood imply
the proprietarian view that parents own their children (see 4.1; Hall 1999; Narveson 2002).
However, property rights seem inappropriate here for several reasons: children cannot be sold and
they cannot be used however the parent wishes. While it might be responded that parental property
rights are limited, prohibiting sale and certain uses, this does not address the more fundamental
objection that persons cannot be property.

Other theories provide more plausible support for parent-centered, as opposed to child-centered,
accounts of parental rights. Brighouse and Swift argue for parental rights on the basis of the
irreplaceable good offered by parenting. Because parenting is a project with goods which cannot
be obtained through other activities, such as the responsibility of caring for a child and the receipt
of children's spontaneous trust, affection, and intimacy, the interest in parenting should be
protected. On this account, parental rights, not parental obligations, are fundamental, because the
parents' interests are the basis for the right (Brighouse and Swift 2006, 2014; see also Shoeman
1980). Brighouse and Swift generate this account partly in response to the challenge of
redistribution: why should children not be redistributed at birth to the best prospective parents, to
maximize children's welfare? But as Gheaus points out, while Brighouse and Swift provide an
account of fundamental parental rights, they do not explain why biological parents have rights to
rear their biological children, rather than such children being redistributed to better prospective
parents, who could thereby undertake their own parenting projects (Gheaus 2012). Finally, a dual-
interest view, grounding rights in interests of both parents and children, is also possible (Macleod
2015).

One important question concerning the content of parental rights is their extent. Parental rights
entitle parents to exclude others, including the state, from child-rearing decisions &ndahs; so long
as parents are competent, and refrain from abuse and neglect (on competency, see Macleod 2015).
One controversial right is the right to infuse children with parents' religious beliefs. On the one
hand, handing down such beliefs to children is, to many, a key aspect of the parental project
(Brighouse and Swift 2006, 2014). Feinberg argued that children have a “right to an open future,”
which such infusion could violate when it threatens children's ability to choose their own religious
or ethical beliefs later (Feinberg 1980). However, the right to an open future appears too
demanding: many parental acts, such as opting for cello over violin lessons, narrow children's
options later, but they seem acceptable. Another tack, taken by Clayton, is to argue that such
“enrolment” violates children's autonomy (Clayton 2006; also Coleman 2003). From a feminist
perspective, Okin argued that religious infusion could affect girls' developing self-respect and equal
opportunity (Okin 1994). But even if such arguments theoretically justify state intervention, their
proponents must explain how, in practice, the state could intervene in the intimate parent-child
relationship without psychologically harming children.

Other questions concerning parental rights concern exclusivity and the number of possible parents.
As step-parenting, procreation involving multiple biological, gestational, and social parents, and
other diverse family forms become more prevalent, why should the number of parents be limited
to two? As noted in Section 1 above, a Canadian court recognized a child as having three parents.
Relatives in addition to the parents are frequently involved in raising children, even in cultures in
which the nuclear family is considered the norm. In the United States, nearly 3 million grandparents
have primary responsibility for children living in their homes and it has been argued that
grandparental rights should be legally recognized (Henderson 2005). Further, some philosophers
have argued for legal recognition or support for non-parental care, as in, for example, African-
American practices of “othermothering” or “revolutionary parenting.” This would permit more
adults to contribute to children's development, thereby arguably benefiting children (Gheaus 2011;
hooks 1984; Collins 1991; Mullin 2005).

So far, we have considered parental rights as parents' moral and legal claims to make, and exclude
others from, decisions regarding their child. But some philosophers have argued for other rights
held by parents—namely, positive rights to social support for child-rearing. These proposals are
discussed in 5.2, as they aim at helping parents discharge their responsibilities.

5.2 Parental Responsibilities

Parenthood inhabits the intersection of two distinct relationships: a custodial relationship between
parent and child, and a trustee relationship between the parents and the larger society or other
collective. Both may generate responsibilities.

The custodial relationship involves a set of duties aimed at, and justified by, the welfare of the
child. As custodian, the parent is under a limited obligation to work for and organize his or her life
around the welfare and development of the child, for the child's sake. Analysis of the content of
parental responsibilities has therefore mostly focused on the rights of the child. Feinberg's right to
an “open future” can be read as a limit on parental discretion (see 5.1). It can also be interpreted as
giving children positive claims to certain goods, such as an education that leaves them with a wide
range of valuable life plans to choose from. Whether there is such a positive right and in what it
consists are matters of dispute (Liao 2015; Mills 2003; Lotz 2006 and 2014; Millum 2014; essays
in Archard and Macleod 2002; entry on children's rights).

Societies, families, and cultural groups also have interests in the welfare of children. For instance,
the state has an interest in the reproduction of its workforce and its citizens; hence parental
decisions that threaten the child's chances of becoming a fully participating citizen may come under
special state scrutiny. Distinct groups, such as the state and cultural groups, may make conflicting
claims on the parents as trustees. For instance, in order to promote culturally prescribed norms,
parents might seek to remove their child from school, or have their daughter undergo
clitoridectomy; yet the state may claim that such a decision violates the parents' trustee relationship
on grounds that the state has a compelling interest in securing the full citizenship capacities and
rights of its citizens (Galston 1995; Tamir 1996; Nussbaum 1996). Moreover, discharging parental
responsibilities must be balanced with discharging obligations of distributive and global justice
(Archard and Macleod 2002, Part III; Macleod 2010).

All parents fail to meet their responsibilities at some point. We would not expect someone to raise
a child without making mistakes along the way. However, at some point, excusable parental
failings shade into neglect and abuse. Exactly what counts as child abuse is a matter for debate.
However, if abuse marks a threshold above which it is permissible for others—particularly the
state—to intervene, then a clear definition is needed (Archard 2004, chap. 14).

By the time neglect or abuse has reached the point that the state intervenes, irreparable damage has
often been caused, and the actions that can be taken to improve a child's situation are likely to be
limited. Some philosophers argue that prospective parents should be screened ahead of time for
their ability to parent and those who are deemed unlikely to be able to fulfill their parental
responsibilities should not be granted parental licenses. The argument in favor of licensing parents
may appeal primarily to the harms to children that occur if unfit people are allowed to parent
(LaFollette 1980, 2010) or to the wider impact on society from rearing children who are unlikely
to become good citizens (McFall 2009). Either way proposals for parental licensing schemes must
show that it is possible prospectively to identify individuals who are likely to be neglectful or
abusive parents with sufficient accuracy, show that the schemes do not violate the rights of
prospective parents (on this see Liao 2015), and explain how they are to be enforced. The latter is
perhaps the hardest challenge: without resorting to compulsory sterilization how can people be
prevented from having children without licenses? (McFall 2009, 122) Of course, there could be
penalties for unlicensed parents, or their children could be subject to confiscation, but such policies
risk inadvertently penalizing the children they were intended to assist. Moreover, enforcement
would disproportionately burden women. As gestators, women might be subjected to de facto
forced abortions; women are also more likely to be primary caregivers, and thus subjected to greater
interference and monitoring (Engster 2010). A further question is whether onerous licensing
policies for adoptive parents can be justified in the absence of more general parental licensing
schemes (McLeod and Botterell 2014).

Finally, children need a great deal of care if they are to grow up into autonomous, healthy adults
and good citizens. Parents clearly have the responsibility to provide some of this care, and the state
has the obligation to step in when parents are failing to do as they should. However, there is an
open question about what the state should provide in cases that do not involve abuse or neglect. As
Alstott has argued, parenting imposes opportunity costs on parents, for example, in earning
potential. Moreover, child-care labor remains gender-structured, with women performing by far
the greater share. On these grounds Alstott argues for caregiver accounts to ensure equal
opportunity, for example, allocating educational funds to parents (Alstott 2004). One pertinent
question is whether parenting should be considered a private good, like an expensive taste which
it would be unjust for society to subsidize (Taylor 2009). Some have responded that it is a matter
of justice due to its effects on equal opportunity for women (Okin 1989, Kittay 1999). Others have
argued for collective social responsibility for children on grounds such as children's welfare and
their status as a public good, providing positive externalities by reproducing society and producing
workers who will support the current generation in old age (George 1987; Archard 2004; Engster
2010; Olsaretti 2013).

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