Life in the Gray Zone: Governance of New Biology in Europe, South Korea, and the United States

灰色地带的生活：欧洲、韩国和美国的新生物学治理知识分子优点：本提案构成了先进工业国家生物科学和生物技术研究与政治和宪法决策共同进化的长期研究的第一阶段。该项目采用创新的跨国研究设计，主要集中在美国、英国和德国，将遵循法律、伦理和社会对两种新型生物结构的反应：动物-人类嵌合体和称为Mycoplasma mycoides JCVI-syn1.0的合成生物。这些发明跨越了三个显著的概念界限，挑战了科学和政策思维：人类和非人类；生命和非生命；人与财产。这些类别的物品是在不同的伦理、法律和文化背景下产生的，这些背景导致了对它们进行分类和管理的不同方式。在一个科学活动全球化的时代？材料交换、科学家流动、出版、数据共享和风险评估？分析和解释不同国家待遇的基础是至关重要的。该项目将在三个方面做出智力贡献：(a)改进公共理性的法律和政治理论，阐明法律和政治决策者如何解释他们对新的生物结构的处理。(b)新的研究方法，以解释民法和普通法宪法文化在管制挑战现有分类的新实体的方法上如何不同。(c)关于管理两个迅速发展的生物学领域（干细胞和合成生物学）的新经验知识，包括有关立法、判例法、伦理原则和管理决定。更广泛的影响：该项目将有助于人力资源开发，并推进哈佛大学科学和技术研究基础设施的建设。它将加强由PI建立的科学与民主网络。它将继续在科研实验室、政策机构和专业社区之间架起桥梁，为STS学者和其他用户构建一个基于网络的公共数据库和研究平台。

Life in the Gray Zone: Governance of New Biology in Europe, South Korea, and the United StatesIntellectual Merit: This proposal constitutes the first phase of a long-term study of the co-evolution of research in the biosciences and biotechnologies together with political and constitutional decisionmaking in advanced industrial nations. Using an innovative cross-national research design, focusing primarily on the US, UK, and Germany, the project will follow legal, ethical, and social responses to two novel biological constructs: animal-human chimeras and the synthetic organism called Mycoplasma mycoides JCVI-syn1.0. These inventions are challenging scientific and policy thinking by crossing three salient conceptual boundaries: human and non-human; life and non-life; person and property. These classes of objects are produced in divergent ethical, legal, and cultural contexts that have given rise to different ways of classifying and governing them. In an era of globalized scientific activity?the exchange of materials, mobility of scientists, publication, data sharing, and risk assessment?it is critically important to analyze and explain the basis for disparate national treatments.The project will make intellectual contributions on three dimensions: (a) Improved legal and political theories of public reason, to illuminate how legal and political decision makers explicate their treatment of novel biologica constructs. (b) Novel research methods to explain how civil and common law constitutional cultures diverge in their approaches to regulating new entities that challenge pre existing classifications. (c) New empirical knowledge about the governance of two rapidly developing areas of biology (stem cells and synthetic biology), including relevant legislation, case law, ethical principles, and regulatory decisions.Broader Impacts: The project will contribute to human resource development and advance efforts to build the infrastructure for science and technology studies at Harvard. It will strengthen the Science and Democracy Network founded by the PI. It will continue bridge-building across scientific research labs, policy institutions, and professional communities, and construct a web-based public database and research platform for STS scholars and other users.