Troubling ‘the norm’? Or, how to become a recognisable, visible gay parent through surrogacy: A comparative analysis of Israeli and German gay couples

Abstract

Over the past two decades, recognition of same-sex relationships and non-normative families has increased alongside greater access to reproductive technologies. Despite this progress, surrogacy, a potential path to parenthood for gay couples, remains banned in many countries. Research indicates that gay couples, facing legal restrictions, often seek reproductive services abroad, navigating complex legal, political and sociocultural contexts in both their home and destination countries. However, existing research lacks cross-country comparisons that explore how different contexts shape gay couples’ reproductive practices. This study enhances our theoretical understanding of the intricate interplay between social structure and social interactions. It explores how normative family conceptions, ingrained in legal frameworks, societal norms and cultural values at the macro level, profoundly influence the (normalising) practices of couples at the micro level. Empirically, this study compares Germany and Israel, where gay couples face starkly different challenges. Germany universally prohibits surrogacy, while Israel permits it, although not for gay men during my interviews. Drawing on interviews with couples from both countries who engaged surrogates abroad, this study analyses their struggles for legal recognition and social visibility as ‘gay father families’. In both countries, couples navigate legal, political and sociocultural contexts differently, encapsulated in a process termed ‘becoming a gay father family’, involving concealing surrogacy and appropriating heteronormative family narratives. The data indicate that the couples’ social interactions reflect and reinforce a discernible normative shift from heteronormativity to repronormativity in the context of assisted reproduction.