co-sponsored by

Center for Genetics and Society
The Graduate Center, CUNY
The Nation Institute
The New York Open Center
Demos

On December 9, 2004, over 400 New Yorkers gathered to hear five noted academics, authors and activists make the case that liberals and progressives need to support socially responsible control over the new human genetic technologies as a priority concern. Presentations were followed by lively discussion.

A report on the Symposium follows. It contains:

Introduction
Hosts
Speakers
Video
Photographs
Texts of Presentations
About the Co-Sponsors
Resources

Introduction

The new human biotechnologies pose some of the most controversial and divisive political challenges of our time. Although many applications promise new ways of preventing and curing disease, others encourage new forms of discrimination, racism, and exclusion. Still others could open the door to a high-tech consumer eugenics that could radically alter the nature of humanity and undermine the foundations of civil society. Meanwhile, the biotech industry has moved rapidly to frame public debate in its favor and build influence within the political parties. With the conclusion of the November elections, liberals and progressives need to consider deeply the implications of the new human biotechnologies for social justice, equality, and democracy.

Hosts

David Levine, Director, Center for Continuting Education, The Graduate Center, CUNY

Richard Hayes, Executive Director, Center for Genetics and Society - Moderator

Speakers

		Marcy Darnovsky, Ph.D., is Associate Executive Director of the Center for Genetics and Society and one of the emerging leaders in the new movement for responsible societal control over new human biotechnologies. She served as lead organizer of the May 2004 conference Gender and Justice in the Gene Age, helped lead the pro-choice opposition to California's Stem Cell Initiative, Proposition 71, and has written and spoken widely on these and related topics. http://www.genetics-and-society.org
		Sheldon Krimsky, Ph.D., is Professor of Urban and Environmental Policy & Planning at Tufts University. His research has focused on the linkages between science/technology, ethics/values and public policy. He is the author of seven books, including Science and the Private Interest: Has the lure of profits corrupted biomedical research? (2003), and Biotechnics and Society: The Rise of Industrial Genetics (1991). Professor Krimsky has served on the National Institutes of Health's Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee, and chaired the Committee on Scientific Freedom and Responsibility for the American Association for the Advancement of Science. http://www.tufts.edu/~skrimsky
		Stuart Newman, Ph.D., is Professor of Cell Biology and Anatomy at New York Medical College. He has been a visiting professor at the Pasteur Institute, Paris, the Centre à l'Energie Atomique-Saclay, Gif-sur-Yvette, the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, and the University of Tokyo. He was a founding member of the Council for Responsible Genetics and is a Fellow of the Institute on Biotechnology and the Human Future, Chicago, IL.His research interests include cellular and molecular mechanisms of vertebrate limb development, physical mechanisms of morphogenesis, and mechanisms of morphological evolution. Other biomedically-related activities include writings on the social and cultural aspects of biological research and technology http://www.nymc.edu/sanewman/
		Dorothy Roberts, J.D., is Kirkland & Ellis Professor of Law at Northwestern University. She has written and lectured extensively on the interplay of gender, race, and class in legal issues concerning reproduction and motherhood. She has authored or edited six books, including Killing the Black Body: Race, Reproduction and the Meaning of Liberty (1997), which received the 1998 Myers Center Award for the Study of Human Rights in North America. Professor Roberts serves as a consultant to the Center for Women Policy Studies in Washington, D.C. and the Open Society Institute's Program on Reproductive Health and Rights, and as a member of the board of directors of the National Black Women's Health Project. http://www.law.nwu.edu/faculty/fulltime/Roberts/Roberts.html
		William Saletan is Chief Political Correspondent for the on-line magazine Slate, and the author of Bearing Right: How Conservatives Won the Abortion War (2003). He is a former editor of the Hotline and a contributor to numerous publications, including The New Republic, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, National Review, the Washingtonian, the Village Voice and Mother Jones. http://www.slate.com

To learn more about the issues being addressed at the symposium, please see the following resources.

Selected Texts by Symposium Speakers

Marcy Darnovsky

• "Cloning and Germline Intervention: Perspectives from the United States on Reproductive Technologies and Biomedicine," presentation given at the Within and Beyond Human Nature conference, Berlin, Germany (October 13, 2003)
  Resources >> CGS>> Cloning and Germline Intervention
• "Sex Selection Moves to Consumer Culture" Genetic Crossroads (August 20, 2003)

Sheldon Krimsky

• Melody Petersen, "A Conversation with Sheldon Krimsky: Uncoupling Campus and Company," The New York Times (September 23, 2003)
  http://www.gene-watch.org/press/NYT-krimsky.html
• "Can Scientists and Physicians Come to Grips with Conflicts of Interest?" Research USA (September 15, 2003) [PDF]
  http://www.tufts.edu/~skrimsky/PDF/Research_USA.PDF

Stuart Newman

• "Averting the clone age: prospects and perils of human developmental gene manipulation, " Journal of Contemporary Health Law and Policy (Vol. 19, pp. 431-463, 2003) [PDF]
  http://www.nymc.edu/sanewman/PDFs/
  J.%20Cont.%20Health%20Law%20&%20Policy_Averting.pdf

Dorothy Roberts

• "Race and the New Reproduction," in Killing the Black Body: Race, Reproduction and the Meaning of Liberty (New York: Pantheon, 1997)
  http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/rt21/race/ROBERTS6.html

William Saletan

• "Revelation of the Nerds: The religion of stem-cell research," Slate (August 10, 2004) http://slate.msn.com/id/2104983/
• "Fetal positions" Mother Jones (May/June 1998)
  http://www.motherjones.com/news/special_reports/1998/05/saletan.html

Audio

Hear author Bill McKibben and Marcy Darnovsky address the challenges of the new human biotechnologies, at the colloquium sponsored by the University of California Graduate School of Journalism (September 28, 2004) [MP3]

Hear Marcy Darnovsky and California State Senator Debra Ortiz debate the merits of the California stem cell initiative, Proposition 71, on KQED Forum hosted by Michael Krasny (October 7, 2004) [RealAudio]

Overview Documents

For a comprehensive overview of the social and political challenges raised by the new human biotechnologies, see the website of the Center for Genetics and Society.

For documents addressing the implications of human biotechnology by feminist and women's health leaders, see the website of the conference Gender & Justice in the Gene Age, held in May 2004 at the Ford Foundation.
http://www.gjga.org

For documents addressing the implications of these technologies for equality and democracy, see the website of the symposium Inequality, Democracy and the New Human Biotechnologies, held in July 2004 at the Century Foundation.

For documents by leaders from Asia, Africa, Europe, the Americas and elsewhere, see the website of the conference Within and Beyond the Limits of Human Nature, held in October 2003 in Berlin, Germany.
http://www.biopolitics-berlin2003.org

Electronic newsletter

For regular updates on important developments, subscribe to Genetic Crossroads, the email newsletter of the Center for Genetics and Society.

"The breadth of biotechnological interventions raises moral questions that are not simply difficult in the familiar sense but are of an altogether different kind..."

-Jurgen Habermas, The Future of Human Nature (2003)