Human genes and neoliberal governance : a Foucauldian critique

Original and interdisciplinary, this is the first book to explore the relationship between a neoliberal mode of governance and the so-called genetic revolution. Looking at the knowledge-power relations in the post-genomic era and addressing the pressing issues of genetic privacy and discrimination in the context of neoliberal governance, this book demonstrates and explains the mechanisms of mutual production between biotechnology and cultural, political, economic and legal frameworks. In the first part Antoinette Rouvroy explores the social, political and economic conditions and consequences of this new ‘perceptual regime’. In the second she pursues her analysis through a consideration of the impact of ‘geneticization’ on political support of the welfare state and on the operation of private health and life insurances. Genetics and neoliberalism, she argues, are complicit in fostering the belief that social and economic patterns have a fixed nature beyond the reach of democratic deliberation, whilst the characteristics of individuals are unusually plastic, and within the scope of individual choice and responsibility.I. The Production of Genetic Knowledge and the Rise of Genetics as New Perceptual Regime. 1. The Production of Genetic Knowledge 2. Scientific and Economic Strength of Genetic Reductionism 3. Policy Implications: Discourses of Genetic Enlightenment as New Disciplinary Devices 4. Genetic Conceptualizations of 'Normality' and the Idea of Genetic Justice 5. Beyond Genetic Universality and Authenticity, the Lure of the 'Genetic Underclass' II. The Socio-Economic Life of Genes: Genetic Risks and Insurance. 6. Previews of the Future as Background 7. Economic and Actuarial Perspective on Genetics and Insurance 8. Practical and Normative Arguments Against 'Genetic Exceptionalist' Legislation 9. The Changing Social Role of Private Insurance: 'Risk' as a New Representational Regime 10. ConclusionPublished version of EUI PhD thesis, 200