Biopolitical Times

The Center for Genetics and Society blog highlights the latest developments in the social, political, and ethical implications of human biotechnologies, with contributions from staff, fellows, consultants, and guest authors.

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A graphic of eugenic selection

Reproductive rights have been a flashpoint in national politics for decades, with the stakes surging after the Supreme Court shredded the right to an abortion. In the current presidential campaign,  the battle over abortion has swelled and morphed to encompass in vitro fertilization (IVF), which has now moved rapidly from widely accepted to partisan hot button. 

This dramatic shift was highlighted by the February decision of the Alabama Supreme Court that granted personhood rights to frozen IVF embryos, signaling that...

Biopolitical Times

It’s been a busy couple of months in biopolitics, with developments in the US, UK, China, Japan, and implicitly on Mars. Time for a brief roundup. 

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Bioethics needs an update

The National Research Act is now 50 years old. It was signed into law on July 12, 1974, as a direct response to publicity about the 1932 “Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male.” The Hastings Bioethics Forum celebrated its anniversary with an...

GATTACA was released in 1997, but — remarkably — is even more relevant now than it was then, as the technologies whose social implications it explores have developed considerably. 

On Thursday, June 13, the California Film Institute presented GATTACA to...

Image by Kuzzat Altay from Unsplash

Uyghurs, a predominantly Muslim minority in China, are mainly located in the autonomous region of Xinjiang. The Chinese government has pursued an aggressive settlement policy in this region since 1949, with the percentage of...