Since the introduction of a new type of anti-abortion legislation in the United States which bans abortions after a fetal heartbeat can be detected, women’s options regarding abortion are being limited. How “problems” are represented or constituted in legislation shows that problems are time, place and context dependant. By using Carol Bacchi’s “What’s the problem represented to be?” approach to policy analysis, problem representations and subjectification effects in the heartbeat bills were identified. The problem representation of abortion as “lack of information” emerged as the central problem representation and the subject positions that were made available limits women’s choices regarding abortion. Fetal rights emerged as the core of the argumentation in the legislation, excluding women’s rights. How the problem of abortion is represented to be, the subjectification effects and the way rights are used and argued for in antiabortion legislation shows how they effectively limits women’s abortion choices.

Through the fetal heartbeat House-Bill-481, Georgia (U.S) has taken a Pro-life stance on the constitutionally enshrined women's reproductive self-determination rights versus the proposed fetus's right to life by banning abortion after six weeks of gestation. The purpose of this research was to analyze how rights are debated in the media, argued in the bill, and presented in the litigation against the bill using a thematic analysis approach guided by the concept of rights. The findings showed that Pro-choice sees the bill as an infringement of women's rights while Pro-life see it as recognizing the proposed fetus's right to life and personhood.