Opponents and supporters of legalized abortion could hardly be more at odds ideologically, yet much of the data they use to fight each other comes from the same pro-abortion rights research center.
Planned Parenthood founded the New York-based Guttmacher Institute in the late 1960’s to provide research and analysis to compliment its work. But Guttmacher, which has since become financially independent from the women’s health and abortion provider, is now the go-to data center for abortion activists on both sides of the fight.
Powerful anti-abortion groups including the American Life League and Americans United for Life often cite Guttmacher’s abortion statistics, rather than information provided by the government. The National Right to Life Committee (NRLC) relies heavily on Guttmacher statistics for its annual “State of Abortion in the United States” report.
No matter how much they hate Planned Parenthood for being the country’s largest abortion provider, a feeling House Republicans expressed Friday by voting to strip federal funding from the group, many activists admit that Guttmacher provides some of the best research out there.
“They have a lot of good abortion data,” said David Christensen, a lobbyist for the Family Research Council. “We certainly disagree with them ideologically, but they do provide information on abortion surveillance.”
Guttmacher says it’s pleased that a variety of groups seek out the information it provides, although it stresses that anti-abortion groups use the data in much different ways than it intends.
“We take it as a compliment that even those who oppose our mission still use our evidence,” said Susan Cohen, Guttmacher’s vice president for public policy. “That’s not only an endorsement of the work we do, it’s important because from our perspective, good policy has to start with credible and reliable evidence.”
But Guttmacher also puts anti-abortion groups in a strange place, as they simultaneously distrust an organization that favors abortion rights but also look to it in the absence of an equally equipped research organization on their own side.
With more than four decades of experience, about 100 employees and about $22 million in revenue each year, the organization is a research powerhouse that dominates the data landscape when it comes to just about anything having to do with reproductive rights. And since it’s on the side of abortion rights, Guttmacher can get information from places no opponent could ever venture: abortion clinics.
Surveillance data provided by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is typically years behind and incomplete, since several states including California, Maryland and New Hampshire don’t report their data to the agency. Guttmacher, on the other hand, provides a more complete picture of the number of abortions performed in the U.S.
“They have the advantage, which won’t change, that an abortion clinic will send them data,” said Chuck Donovan, president of the Charlotte Lozier Institute, a spin-off from the Susan B. Anthony List. “We can’t write the nation’s abortion clinics, them knowing who we are and our worldview, and expect them to give us data.”
Donovan founded the Charlotte Lozier Institute nearly four years ago as an anti-abortion counter to Guttmacher, as he’s convinced the movement needs its own serious research group. But he admits that getting enough resources has been an uphill battle and it hasn’t been until the last few months that he’s felt much support from other activists.
Charlotte Lozier has just three full-time employees, compared to Guttmacher’s flock of researchers, and just a small fraction of the funding. The group is about to announce a number of new research scholars, but the whole venture has been slow going, Donovan said.
“It’s been harder than I thought it would be in terms of attracting support,” he said. “On the other hand, I think we’ve turned the corner. Money has started to flow enough to let us plan ahead.”
Even if interest in Charlotte Lozier is starting to pick up, Donovan acknowledges his group won’t gain a strong footing for a decade or more, meaning Guttmacher will likely be the biggest force in the area of sexual and reproductive health research for quite some time.
Regardless of ideology, many who seek out Guttmacher’s data find it easy to use, something the group says it strives hard for. As states have passed a varied web of abortion regulations over the last few years, it has constantly updated data sheets showing new laws in each state. Cohen said the group plans to unveil a more user-friendly website this fall.
Where users of Guttmacher’s data knock heads is in the analysis. Anti-abortion groups will cite the group’s statistics and simultaneously criticize its interpretation. Last year, NRLC didn’t dispute Guttmacher’s report on the declining abortion rate, but did take issue with it conclusion that the lowered rate is due to better contraceptive use.
Instead, NRLC gave its own conclusion: that the declining abortion rate is mostly because women are changing their minds about whether it’s okay to get an abortion and because of new abortion-limiting laws.
“The Guttmacher report attempts to downplay the impact of pro-life legislation during the period covered by the report,” the group wrote at the time. “However this ignores the significant educational impact of the public policy debate surrounding pro-life legislation.”
Guttmacher feels just as strongly about passing along its own interpretation of data, and Cohen said she finds it somewhat troubling when abortion foes use only the numbers but draw their own conclusions.
“Some in the policy domain who are working against sexual and reproductive health and rights are using good evidence, but not to advance policies we would argue are promoting health,” she said. “What’s happening is their analysis of the data often comes out to be antithetical to what we’ve interpreted.”
