Unintended Consequences: Birth Control, Abortion, and the Federal Government in Modern America. by Donald T. Critchlow (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Pr., 1999) Reviewed by: Simone M. Caron

This study opens with the establishment in 1952 of the Population Council, which quickly assumed a leadership role in the formation of an international network to promote population research, demographic studies and programmes in population control throughout the world. The early 1960s witnessed a deluge of policy propositions which predicted dire consequences in the face of uncontrolled population growth. Inconsistent federal support caused both the Ford Foundation and the Population Council to focus more closely on research rather than the provision of planning services. Although white males working through nonprofit organizations were largely responsible for lobbying in support of family planning policies, abortion reform brought feminists and grassroots groups to the cause, switching the focus of the debate from population control to the question of rights, of both the woman and fetus. The appointment of Joan Dunlop by Rockefeller in 1973 signaled a change in direction at the Population Council. Her critique of the simplistic cure-all panacea offered by the movement, which ignored "the real social and economic problem of less developed countries" and the influence of his daughters and nieces, moved Rockefeller away from focusing solely on contraception to "adopt a larger agenda of social and economic reform, including health care, education, economic development and women's rights". "...a very valuable contribution."