This research project investigates national ethics policies in Germany, France and Great Britain from 1978 until the present. It analyzes political processes having to do with the emergence of institutions and procedures of bioethical policy advising and their interactions with political decision-makers as well as the public. The study provides answers to empirical and analytical as well as normative questions. First, it investigates a new linking of politics and ethics in the field of biomedical policy and how this new relationship may be characterized. Second, it investigates how these institutions and procedures may be assessed from the perspective of democratic politics. The project proceeds from the assumption that bioethical policies are the result of conflicting processes in which differing interpretations of problems compete with one another. At the core of the analysis is the question as to which interpretations of problems and conflicts are adopted and in what way these are formulated in bioethical policies. Particularly important is the analysis of the specific idea of »ethics«, »politics«and »science« underlying current ethic policies and how ethics, politics and science can be put into an adequate relationship with one another. Furthermore, these ideas are studied regarding their implications for democracy: how is the relationship between politicians, scientific experts, experts on ethics and the public construed? Do the investigated bioethics policies provide a contribution toward the democratization of biomedical policy in the sense of the advancement of democratic participation opportunities and authentic, power-free forms of communication in the shaping of opinions and decision-making processes?

This study is based theoretically and methodologically on new interpretative approaches in policy analysis, such as deliberative policy analysis by Frank Fisher, frame analysis by Martin Rein and Donald Schön and the concept of discourse coalitions by Maarten Hajer. It links these approaches with the concept of democratization by John Dryzek and with that of political rationality by Michel Foucault and the gouvernmentality studies. This study links the analysis from the perspective of the gouvernmentality studies with a democratic action-oriented perspective thereby providing a contribution to the further development of policy analysis.

 

Duration: 1.01.2004 – 31.05.2007

 

Conferences

The politics of Ethics and the Crisis of Government – Tagung, University of Washington, Seattle, 24. – 26.05.2006

Mapping Biopolitics. Medical-Scientific Transformations and the Rise of New Forms of Governance – Workshop durchgeführt vom Projekt »Ethical Governance« von Prof. Braun, Granada, 14. – 19.04.2005

Mapping Biopolitics – Autorentreffen unterstützt durch das European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR), Leiter: Kathrin Braun / Herbert Gottweis, Kopenhagen, 15.10.2005

 

Further reading

Braun, Kathrin (2005): »Not Just for Experts: The Public Debate about Reprogenetics in Germany.« In: Hastings Center Report 35, H. 3.

Braun, Kathrin (2007): »Biopolitics and Temporality in Arendt and Foucault.« In: Time & Society Vol. 16, No. 1 (peer reviewed).

Braun, Kathrin: »Women, Embryos, and the Good Society. Gendering the Bioethics Debate in Germany.« In: Melissa Haussmann / Birgit Sauer (Hg.): Gendering the State in the Age of Globalization. Women's Movements and State Feminism in Post-Industrial Democracies. Boulder / London. [im Erscheinen]

Herrmann, Svea Luise (2003): »Deregulation via Regulation: On the Moralisation and Naturalisation of Embryonic Stem Cell Research in the British Parliamentary Debates of 2000/2001.« In: Österreichische Zeitschrift für Politikwissenschaft, H. 2, S. 149-161.

Herrmann, Svea Luise / Sabine Könninger (2008): »› ... but you can not influence the direction of your thinking.‹ Guiding Self-Government in Bioethics Policy Discourse.« In: Katz Rothman / Barbara Armstrong / Elizabeth M. Armstrong (Hg.): Bioethical Issues: Sociological Perspectives. [im Erscheinen]