Catalogue Number
NMLH.2023.115
Object Name
Poster
Title
Sterilisation - scientific barbarism of imperialism
Place
India; Africa
Date
1972-1982
Description
The Poster Collective was a collective formed in 1971 at the Slade School of Art,  a group formed to initially produce posters in response to the miners strike and on the wars in both Vietnam and Ireland. It was formed on the basis of developing a coherent visual style, which addressed the political issues of the time. This included the armed struggles against colonialism in Africa, the struggle of women for equal rights and the continuing struggle against racism. The collective was active in the 70's and 80's, producing posters on a wide range of issues, including for educational purposes. The group was not-for-profit and used a variety of hand-printing techniques to create their posters. This is a large black and white poster, titled "Sterilisation - scientific barbarism of imperialim." This poster is about forced sterilisation, enacted by West governments government, to people in other countries/British colonies. There are several images on this photo - this is a large
photograph of a soldier holding a baby, a smaller photograph of two children, an image of a tractor on a field of wheat, and an image of a car. There are several newspaper clippings from articles about sterilisation. The bottom of the poster says, "Social revolution - the only antidote." The first newspaper clipping is on the top left of the poster; its headline is "when other people's babies are bad for business." The snippet is about Bengali children and how "The U.S government is seeking to provide the means to sterilise a quarter of all Third World women in part to protect the interests of American business overseas." There is a quote on the top of the poster, from Robert Lanson which reads, "Rapid population growth has made economic growth and stability difficult to maintain in some parts of the world, thereby adding to the need for programmes and forces to maintain internal order and to defend against guerilla warfare." The second newspaper clipping is titled, "'Banned
birth jab used in Third world." The article talks about Western governments financing the use of sterilisation jabs among illiterate "village women in the third world." The third headline is "The sterilisation scandal in India." This article is about the forced sterilisation of Indian people. There is a quote at the bottom of the poster from August Bebel; "The fear of over-population is very old. It was touched upon in connection with the social condition of the Greeks and Romans, and at the close of the middle ages, Plato and Aristotle, the Romans, the small bourgeois of the middle ages were all swayed by it and it even swayed voltaire. The fear turns up again - this circumstance must be emphasised -at periods when existing social conditions are disintegraing and breaking down."
