I rarely take sides when it comes to a complex issue. My apparent neutrality isn’t due to a lack of interest, knowledge, or courage. I simply believe that the truth often lies in the eyes of the beholder; that we don’t just see different problems, but we contemplate different solutions, and that those discrepancies are, in themselves, legitimate.
This relativism sharpened when I came to live in Spain. In all these years I’ve observed how most people take a firm stance on any topic of debate, whether international conflicts, public policies, or solutions to social problems. The complexity entailed by any phenomenon, which pushes me to try to understand it, to know the different points of view and to compare approaches, is often reduced to a simple “for” or “against.” This Manichaeism I also found in the debate on surrogacy.
In Spain, Law 14/2006 declares void ab initio any surrogacy contract, with or without a price, and establishes that the mother is the woman who gives birth. In 2023, the reform of the abortion law went a step further: it classified surrogacy as a form of reproductive violence against women and prohibited its commercial promotion. The Supreme Court has reiterated in several rulings that these contracts constitute a form of exploitation of women and a harm to the best interests of the child. And since May 1, 2025, an instruction from the General Directorate of Legal Security and Public Faith is in effect that closes the avenue by which babies born via surrogacy abroad were registered in the Civil Registry.
I’ve also encountered rejection of any form of regulation of surrogacy in my circle, among people who, a priori, start from antagonistic ideological positions. Some base their stance on nature or on a higher being; others argue that this practice commodifies the woman’s body and abuses it.
When people have asked me how I position myself on the matter, I explain that advancing a motion for rejection in full is tricky for me and that it depends on the case. Depending on the circumstances in which the practice occurs, I can question it or, on the contrary, see it as an opportunity. For the latter, I think of situations I know up close: heterosexual couples, homosexuals, and single people who, for one reason or another, have not been able to conceive or carry a child. Thanks to surrogacy, they could fulfill the wish to become parents without it taking place in miserable places, under intolerable conditions, or under direct or indirect coercion.
“Depending on the circumstances in which the practice occurs, I can question it or, conversely, see it as an opportunity”
In these informal conversations I even came to admit that I wouldn’t have minded being a surrogate altruistically toward those who want to have children and cannot. But, no matter how much I built a discourse that I believed to be sensible, I often saw it dismissed without reflection or truly addressing what I had just exposed. So I chose to remain silent, and surrogacy joined my list of taboo topics.
The urge to share my opinion on this debate arose a few days ago, when I read a news item about the Dutch prime minister, Rob Jetten, from the socially liberal party D66. It stated that he and his partner, the Argentine field hockey player Nicolás Keenan, will become parents to a baby born in 2027 thanks to an egg donor and a surrogate. In the photo they shared, the three — Rob, Nico, and Lisa, the woman carrying their child — appeared happy, alongside a message of thanks to the donor. The surrogate and the donor are people in their close circle, and there is no commercial transaction involved.
I felt very proud of the four and of a Dutch regulation that allows couples to fulfill a desire many of us share, the desire to raise a child, care for them, love them, and, through that care, build a new generation full of affection and hope. And it made me think of something else: in the Netherlands, such a news item can be met with applause or with reservations, but hardly with a slam of the debate.
In the Netherlands, . What the Penal Code punishes is the profit motive: it is prohibited to broker commercially and to publicly advertise that a surrogate is sought or offered, and the surrogate cannot receive any remuneration. The law regards the mother as the woman who gives birth, so the intended parents only become legal parents after a judicial proceeding following birth, usually an adoption.
“In the Netherlands, such a news item can be met with applause or with reservations, but hardly with a slam of the debate”
This could change soon: Parliament will debate before the end of the year the Children’s, Surrogacy and Parentage Act. If approved, a judge will be able to validate the agreement before pregnancy, so that the intended parents become legal parents from birth. Additionally, counseling will be mandatory, each party will have their own lawyer, the child’s right to know their origins will be reinforced, and the profit motive will remain prohibited, to the point of penalizing payments for the transfer of parentage, even when carried out abroad. Its stated aim is to better protect the child, the surrogate, and the intended parents, and to combat exploitation.
I am not writing these lines to present the Dutch regulation as a model we should import, nor to claim that it has resolved the dilemmas this practice raises. The most critical will say that this regulation does not guarantee that all cases will be like this or that abuse will be prevented one hundred percent. I won’t be the one to deny that.
I write to defend the right to ask questions: under what conditions might surrogacy be accepted and under which not. When there is coercion, economic need, or a clear inequality between the parties, rejection finds broad consensus. When it concerns an adult woman, informed, without pressure, and accompanied throughout the process, that consensus may not be so clear. Between the two extremes lies a wide range of greys that prohibition does not allow to explore, and a calm conversation could. Debating does not mean defending exploitation of the woman’s body or neglecting the child’s best interests. On the contrary: it means taking both seriously.
“Between the two extremes lies a broad range of greys that prohibition does not allow exploring, and a calm conversation could”
Let us recognize that not everything has to be negative, and that from positive experiences like this one, regulations and practices can be built and replicated. That would open the door to prudence and the analysis of each specific case before judging a practice as inherently good or bad.
My plea is modest: give space to quiet, prudent, and dissenting voices. They don’t make noise, but that does not make them any less legitimate, even though, in the country I now belong to, the majority that shouts hardly ever takes them into account. Perhaps a somewhat more measured debate —boring, as a Dutch person might say— would make us all a little happier.
