ABSTRACT

This chapter focuses on how regulation may facilitate the integration of those different perspectives. Integration does not mean the replacement of a multitude of perspectives with the regulatory imposition of just one. The chapter explores three different aspects of genetic technology: genetically modified organisms and genetically engineered products, genetic technology in the human and medical context, and that of the rights to the exploitation of genetic technology. Techniques of genetically modifying organisms are well advanced, and an increasing number of genetically engineered products are being developed and marketed. Gene therapy is a far more difficult technique than testing, and this difficulty has consequences for the focus and design of the regulation. The regulation both anticipates and requires that gene therapy be conducted purely in a research context. Cloning provides perhaps one of the starkest examples of the fundamental differences in the way that genetic technology can be perceived.