ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on a key area in which these expectations have been articulated, namely official health and science policy documents. It examines the construction of discourses of promise associated with both genomics and the bioeconomy. The chapter argues that the creation and maintenance of high levels of hope around the future potential of genomics for economic growth and competition in the bioeconomy has been key to sustaining support and investment. It builds on existing work which has examined the role of socio-technical expectations in constituting both the field of genomics and the idea of the bioeconomy. In terms of performativity the White Paper linked the 'new' genetics to a discourse of national competitiveness and the modernisation of the National Health Service, two major concerns of the New Labour government. The chapter presents an analysis of some of the main shifts in UK policy discourses around genetics and genomics over the 15 years since the sequencing of the human genome.
