Institutional frameworks and terms of reference: The public discussion on clinical xenotransplantation in Australia

Peta S. Cook

Science and Public Policy, 2014, vol. 41, issue 5, 673-684

Abstract: This paper explores how institutional frameworks compromised the potential for public engagement on clinical xenotransplantation in Australia. Through critical discourse analysis, these limitations are exposed through two factors: the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Act, which limits public consultation to being responsive; and the terms of reference provided to the Xenotransplantation Working Party, which constrained their consultative practices. These findings contribute towards understandings of public participatory practices by examining how frameworks that exist prior to public involvement, including institutional acts and terms of reference, can marginalize the publics and continue to give authority to those voices that already hold privilege. As a result, there is a need to alter how public consultation is framed in the NHMRC Act, which will provide an opportunity to reframe and improve consultative practices and potentially facilitate meaningful discursive public debate and engagement on scientific matters in Australia.

Date: 2014
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/scipol/scu002 (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oup:scippl:v:41:y:2014:i:5:p:673-684.

Access Statistics for this article

Science and Public Policy is currently edited by Nicoletta Corrocher, Jeong-Dong Lee, Mireille Matt and Nicholas Vonortas

More articles in Science and Public Policy from Oxford University Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Oxford University Press ().