Abstract
This review article discusses Melinda Cooper and Catherine Waldby’s recent book, Clinical Labor. Tissue donors and research subjects in the global bio-economy (Duke, 2014), as a topical contribution to the literatures on the bio-economy, and to studies of life sciences, society, and policy more generally. The article contextualizes the book within existing literatures (1) and thoroughly considers its conceptual approach as well as its findings (2). Further, it discusses its value as a contribution, arguing that clinical labor also presents an intriguing framework for further research, thereby suggesting some possible directions (3).
Highlights
This review article discusses Melinda Cooper and Catherine Waldby’s recent book, Clinical Labor
Policy makers and stakeholders puzzle about how the life sciences are to be successfully commercialized, what kinds of legal and technical infrastructures need to be put in place, and what kinds of specialized labor force needs to be created to bring about a thriving bioeconomy (Hilgartner 2007)
Haddad Life Sciences, Society and Policy (2015) 11:9 forms, such as patented microbes or stem cells? How, and to which extent, are markets created for entities hitherto excluded from market relations, such as human tissues and body parts? How do these “tissue economies” (Mitchell and Waldby 2008) play out in globally refracted networks? In which ways do these novel articulations of knowledge and value impact on social relationships, identities, and forms of subjectivity? (Thacker 2005, Sunder Rajan 2006, 2012; Cooper 2008; Birch 2012; Dussauge et al 2015)
Summary
This review article discusses Melinda Cooper and Catherine Waldby’s recent book, Clinical Labor. The authors suggest that despite the abundance of reflections on the bioeconomy in academic and policy discourse, “few have explored the very material ways in which the in vivo biology of human subjects is enrolled into the postFordist labor process” (Cooper & Waldby 2014: 7).
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