Producing 'Human Elements Based Medical Technologies' in Biotech Companies: Some Ethical and Organisational Ingredients for Innovative Cooking

Virginie Tournay (), Emmanuelle Rial-Sebbag (), Doerte Bemme, Aurélie Mahalatchimy (), Céline Granjou (), Séverine Louvel () and Anne Cambon-Thomsen ()
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Virginie Tournay: CEVIPOF - Centre de recherches politiques de Sciences Po (Sciences Po, CNRS) - Sciences Po - Sciences Po - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
Emmanuelle Rial-Sebbag: INSERM - Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale
Doerte Bemme: UdeM - Université de Montréal
Aurélie Mahalatchimy: PACTE - Pacte, Laboratoire de sciences sociales - UPMF - Université Pierre Mendès France - Grenoble 2 - UJF - Université Joseph Fourier - Grenoble 1 - IEPG - Sciences Po Grenoble - Institut d'études politiques de Grenoble - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
Céline Granjou: CEMAGREF - Centre national du machinisme agricole, du génie rural, des eaux et forêts
Séverine Louvel: PACTE - Pacte, Laboratoire de sciences sociales - UPMF - Université Pierre Mendès France - Grenoble 2 - UJF - Université Joseph Fourier - Grenoble 1 - IEPG - Sciences Po Grenoble - Institut d'études politiques de Grenoble - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
Anne Cambon-Thomsen: INSERM - Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale

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Abstract: This article is based on the findings of an EU-funded qualitative research project, entitled 'From GMP to GBP: Fostering good bioethics practices [GBP] among the European biotechnology industry', which seeks to improve the understanding of bioethical issues through the observation of the daily practices in European biotechnology companies and proposes a methodology approaching ethical issues. The comparative study was carried out in biotech companies in France, Italy, Sweden, Hungary and Belgium which develop a wide range of new technologies, all of them involving human materials or where human subjects participate (in clinical trials). Based on our findings in these local settings, we suggest that the notion of bioethics and the way its production is theorised need to be re-conceptualised. We argue that material practices and moral statements are intermingled in inextricable ways that render the formation of bioethical concerns fully dependent on the organisational landscape in which it is embedded. More precisely, the here presented co-production model of moral statements and organisational practices presents a set of common factors that influence how bioethical discourses are shaped, despite the heterogeneity of their epistemic cultures. For example, the procedural design of cell-based-products, the modes of collecting and storing biological specimen, the relationship between patients and companies and technological transfers to emerging countries are defining components that contribute to the shaping process of bioethical concerns. Thus, the path dependency of bioethical concerns relies on an already existing, specific infrastructure and existing relationships within and outside a company rather than on external judgement subsequently applied to its objects, or a collection of processes of reasoning coming from external institutions.

Keywords: Biobanks; Science; Biotech companies (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013-03
Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://sciencespo.hal.science/hal-01560540v2
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Published in Science Technology and Society, 2013, 18 (1), pp.93 - 114. ⟨10.1177/0971721813484381⟩

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:spmain:hal-01560540

DOI: 10.1177/0971721813484381

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