The future of ELSA genomics
The future of ELSA genomics
This project poses three “meta-questions”: how does research into the ethical, legal and social aspects (ELSA) or implications (ELSI) of genomics take shape nowadays, and how can it do so in future, as well as what are the science governance contexts within which ELSA genomics programs are carried out?
ELSA programs involve anticipatory research and focus on technologies that are expected to have an impact in the future of society and sciences (e.g. genomics, nanotechnology, ICT). Institutions are invented for doing ELSA work. The project uses the development of CSG and other centers (such as in UK the www.genomicsnetwork.ac.uk) as case studies to analyze current developments within ELSA genomics in the broader context of science governance.
Research into the ethical, legal and social aspects of new emerging technologies is a relatively new field. It often goes beyond mere research, incorporating education and communication tasks, posing difficult question about the feasibility of ELSA work. It accompanies the implementation of new technologies and “big science” investments, and it is, from different parties, expected to be critical as well as supportive. While most programs clearly aim to be “relevant to society”, it is often unclear how this “relevance” will affect the process of policy development. We assume that too often the programming of ELSA research is still based on rather naïve conceptions of key issues such as democracy (engagement of stakeholders and publics), of interdisciplinary (collaboration between social sciences and life sciences) and of how being able to be relevant for policy development.
Start project: January 2007
Some outcomes from this project are:
- An international workshop on ‘Doing Society and Genomics – Convergence Work and Competence Building’, held in Nijmegen, NL, in September 2008
- Article series on ‘Convergence Research’ in the EMBO reports Science & Society Series, started in February 2009
- International Corsage Winter Meeting 2008, held in Nijmegen, NL, titled ‘Genomics in the Policy Room', in cooperation with young life scientists from GeNeYous.nl