Nature, Risk and Responsibility: Discourses of Biotechnology

by Patrick O'Mahony (Editor)

Overview

This book explores ethical interpretations of biotechnology and examines whether sufficient consensus exists or is emerging to enable this technology to occupy a stable role in the techno-economic, social, and cultural order. It employs a wide range of social theories to evaluate risks.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781000143416
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	09/29/2020
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	242
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Patrick O'Mahony is Director of the Centre for European Social Research, University College, Cork. He is co-author of Rethinking Irish History (1998).

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements -- Notes on the Contributors -- Introduction: Biotechnology, Uncertainty and Contestation /Patrick O ’Mahony -- Part I Theoretical Reflections on Biotechnology and Responsibility -- 1 The Civilisation of the Gene: Biotechnological Risk Framed in the Responsibility Discourse /Piet Strydom -- 2 Biopolitics in the Risk Society: the Possibility of a Global Ethic of Societal Responsibility /Gerard Delanty -- 3 Biotechnology as Expertise Barry Barnes -- Part II Constructing Values: Public Communication on Biotechnology -- 4 Shifting Debates on New Reproductive Technology: Implications for Public Discourse in Ireland /Orla McDonnell -- 5 Biotechnological Communication and the Socio-Cultural Embeddedness of Economic Actors /Marion Dreyer -- 6 Constructing Difference: Discourse Coalitions on Biotechnology in the Press /Patrick Oy Mahony and Tracey Skillington -- Part III The Dynamics of Institutionalisation: Juridification and Regulation of Biotechnology -- 7 Public Representation and the Legal Regulation of Assisted Conception in Britain /John Murphy -- 8 Discourse Formations and Constellations of Conflict: Problems of Public Participation in the German Debate on Genetically Altered Plants /Alfons Bora -- 9 Law and the Cultural Construction of Nature: -- Biotechnology and the European Legal Framework /Christian Byk -- 10 Bio-patenting and Innovation: Nomads of the Present and a New Global Order /Ruth McNally and Peter Wheale -- Part IV Concluding Reflections -- 11 Modernity’s Organic Economy of Governmentality /Tracey Skillington -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index.

Editorial Reviews

"This volume attempts to address a topic of considerable importance to our contemporary world. It raises issues about which sociologists should be informed." -- Lawrence Busch, Contemporary Sociology

From the Publisher