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Article ID: CBB072011815

Taking responsibility, making irresponsibility: Controversies in human gene editing (2022)

Morgan Meyer (Author)

Social Studies of Science
Volume: 52
Issue: 1
Pages: 127-143
Publication date: 2022
Language: English

DOI: 10.1177/03063127211025631

URI: https://doi.org/10.1177/03063127211025631

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Human embryology CRISPR-Cas9 Biomedicine Genetic engineering Social responsibility Science and technology studies (STS) Research Controversies and disputes Gene editing 21st century

In current discussions, human germline editing is often called ‘irresponsible’. Looking at the international summits on human gene editing held in 2015 and in 2018 and the announcement by He Jiankui of the birth of two gene-edited babies in November 2018, this article analyses how ‘irresponsible’ research was the result of various (dis)qualifications and demarcations. Against a background of discussions of responsibility, an individual scientist was singled out, his experiments were scrutinized for their soundness, legality and safety and ethical and moral stances were questioned. These are features of a process that I call ‘irresponsibilization’. This irresponsibilization of research is entangled with calls for further action: Irresponsible research like that of He Jiankui should be contained, the veracity of knowledge claims needs to be confirmed, and institutions and decision-makers are called to act. The controversy turned ‘irresponsible’ into an active category, and rendered explicit its political, institutional and practical ramifications.

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