Germany is an interesting case with respect to the governance of reprogenetics. It has a strong profile in the technosciences and high aims regarding the global bioeconomy, yet her regulation of human genetics, reproductive medicine and embryo research has for a long time been rather restrictive. German biopolitical exceptionalism has often been explained by reference to Catholicism and the legacy of the Nazi past. The Germans, so goes the common story, have learnt the lessons of history and translated them into (...) unconditional respect for human dignity, which in turn translates into unconditional protection of human life, including the human embryo, and the firm repudiation of any eugenic distinction between ‘life worth to live’ and ‘life not worth to live’. This, however, is not the whole story. Alongside deontological strictness we find another strand of governing body politics and reprogenetics in Germany, the rule-and-exception model, running from the mid-1970s abortion law via the 2002 Stem Cell Act to the 2011 regulation of pre-implantation genetic diagnosis. In contrast to the former, that strongly draws on Kant and his concept of human dignity, the latter bears resemblances to Carl Schmitt's concept of state of exception. The article will show that the rule-and-exception model builds the exception into the rule and transforms the meaning and mandate of ethics, namely from safeguarding ethical standards to deciding about the exception. Given that the exception has now tended to become the rule, the question is whether the lessons of history will govern German reprogenetics for much longer. (shrink)

When reproductive and genetic technologies spurred an extended German policy debate, the issues at stake went beyond the technologies to include the very meaning of “ethics” and the respective roles of ethicists and of the public in thinking about ethical questions.

The article analyses what we term governmental ethics regimes as forms of scientific governance. Drawing from empirical research on governmental ethics regimes in Germany, Franceand the UK since the early 1980s, it argues that these governmental ethics regimes grew out of the technical model of scientific governance, but have departed from it in crucial ways. It asks whether ethics regimes can be understood as new ‘‘technologies of humility’’ and answers the question with a ‘‘yes, but’’. Yes, governmental ethics regimes have (...) incorporated features that go beyond technologies of prediction and control, but the overcoming of the technical model also bears some ambivalence that needs to be understood. The article argues that governmental ethics regimes can be understood as a form of ‘‘reflexive government’’ in that the commitment to techno-scientific innovation is stabilized not through an elitist, technocratic exclusion of non-scientific actors and knowledges or a depreciation of normative and emotional dimensions, but through their inclusion, involvement and mobilization. (shrink)

: When reproductive and genetic technologies spurred an extended German policy debate, the issues at stake went beyond the technologies to include the very meaning of "ethics" and the respective roles of ethicists and of the public in thinking about ethical questions.

This article traces the semantics of ?life? and ?vitality? in Carl Schmitt up to the 1930s. It shows that Schmitt deploys these vitalist elements against the modern ?spirit of technicity? in his attempt to combat the lack of substantial ideas in modern politics. However, Schmitt himself cannot escape a fundamental political relativism. There remains an unstable tension at the heart of his thought between the quest for substance and the quest for order. The latter is relativist because it is a (...) quest for order as such, any order. Although Schmitt's semantics of life and vitality is not drawn from a biological register, it adopted a völkisch meaning in 1933. Anti-Semitism becomes a form of life and racial homogeneity fills in for substance. The article concludes that, while there are good reasons for criticizing the modern ?spirit of technicity,? Schmitt's critical model is fundamentally flawed. (shrink)

​Das Buch versammelt konstruktivistische Perspektiven auf das Konzept „Biopolitik“. Dadurch werden die Analysepotentiale für aktuelle Phänomene, die den Zusammenhang zwischen dem Leben und dem Lebendigen und der Regierbarmachung betreffen, ausgelotet. Im Fokus stehen die Strategien und die Objekte der Regierungs- und Regulierungsbemühungen: In welcher Weise werden gesellschaftliche Probleme konstruiert und bestimmten „Zielscheiben“ zugeschrieben? Welche Subjektivierungsformen lassen sich im Rahmen biopolitischer Zugriffe ausmachen? Inwiefern spielen spezifische sozialtheoretische Überlegungen und Konzeptionen von Zeit für biopolitische Strategien und Konflikte eine Rolle? An welchen Gegenständen (...) sind die fortdauernden Konflikte, die sich im Spannungsfeld zwischen Medizin, Ethik und Politik ergeben, zu explizieren? (shrink)