Control from Within? Power, Identity, and the Human Genome Project

Abstract

As this century approaches its conclusion, biological research has been gearing up for a total revolution that will almost certainly alter the way societies imagine and interact with the human body. While determined social effects do not necessarily result from the emergence of any science or technology, their combination with already existing human relations can lead to drastic societal change. In the case of the Human Genome Project a research endeavor charting out the full complement of human genetic material the potential for social consequences seems rather enormous. Not only is the study of biology being recast in a light that verges on essentialism, but it is also being positioned as a form of technoscience in which the economic, scientific, technical, organic, and textual coalesce.1 Not surprisingly, given the project's magnitude, a range of nonscientific research has emerged related to the potential social ramifications of mapping the human genome. Strangely, however, the overwhelming majority of this work remains contained within the disciplinary boundary of bioethics.2 Starting from an assumption that genome technology will inevitably advance, bioethical researchers focus their consideration on the potential for individual abuse as well as protective measures for society.3 This article reconsiders the debate surrounding the genome project, as well as its spinoff effects, by examining alternative understandings of the sociopolitical ethos in which it is made possible. It argues that the very incentives that motivate genome research also portend very troubling possibilities for (re) inscriptions of power, sociopolitical control, and disruptions of prevailing notions of identity.