The international growth and influence of bioethics has led some to identify it as a decisive shift in the location and exercise of 'biopower'. This book provides an in-depth study of how philosophers, lawyers and other 'outsiders' came to play a major role in discussing and helping to regulate issues that used to be left to doctors and scientists. It discusses how club regulation stemmed not only from the professionalising tactics of doctors and scientists, but was compounded by the 'hands-off' approach of politicians and professionals in fields such as law, philosophy and theology. The book outlines how theologians such as Ian Ramsey argued that 'transdisciplinary groups' were needed to meet the challenges posed by secular and increasingly pluralistic societies. It also examines their links with influential figures in the early history of American bioethics. The book centres on the work of the academic lawyer Ian Kennedy, who was the most high-profile advocate of the approach he explicitly termed 'bioethics'. It shows how Mary Warnock echoed governmental calls for external oversight. Many clinicians and researchers supported her calls for a 'monitoring body' to scrutinise in vitro fertilisation and embryo research. The growth of bioethics in British universities occurred in the 1980s and 1990s with the emergence of dedicated centres for bioethics. The book details how some senior doctors and bioethicists led calls for a politically-funded national bioethics committee during the 1980s. It details how recent debates on assisted dying highlight the authority and influence of British bioethicists.
Air Accidents Investigation Branch
Advisory Committee on Alcoholism
American Medical Association
Air Navigation Order
British Airline Pilots Association
British Broadcasting Corporation
British Diabetic Association
British European Airways
British Overseas Airways Corporation
Civil Aviation Authority
California Institute of Technology
Civil Aviation Publication
coronary heart disease
Confidential Human Factors Incident Reporting Programme
Central Office of Information
Committee on Medical and Nutritional Aspects of Food Policy
Department of Health and Social Security
L-amino acid decarboxylase
European Aviation Safety Agency
electroencephalogram
Food and Drug Agency
Flying Personnel Research Committee
Flight Time Limitations Board
Health Education Council
Health of Munition Workers Committee
Health and Safety at Work Act 1974
International Civil Aviation Organization
Industrial Fatigue Research Board
International Physiological Expedition to Antarctica
International Union of Biological Sciences
International Union of Physiological Sciences
L-dihydroxyphenylalanine: L-isomer of the amino acid D
Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food
monoamine oxidase inhibitor
Medical Officer of Health
National Advisory Committee on Nutrition Education
National Childbirth Trust
National Health Service
physical education
positron emission tomography
Royal Air Force
Resource Allocation Working Party
recommended daily allowance
Royal Geographical Society
Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research
substantia nigra compactica
Tridimensional Character Inventory
The National Archives
Tridimensional Personality Questionnaire
University of California San Diego
ventral tegmental area
World Health Organization