ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the scope and context of the new genetics. Firstly, it describes the espoused aims and characteristics of the new genetics and its purported contributions to advancing health, and critically examines the claim that the new genetics is fundamentally different from, and opposed to, the old eugenics. It then examines the conditions shaping the emergence and application of genetic ideas in pursuit of ‘the public’s’ health, and the manifestations of, and imperatives surrounding, the effort to manage genetic risk. In the last chapter, we began to develop our perspective on the new genetics as it is being applied in the advancement of the public’s health, showing how it is changing the ways we think about the self, the body, and society. As we argued, genetic ideas are transforming the conception of public health, generating new domains for analysis and intervention, and expanding the scope of public health to include analysis of gene-environment interactions in the etiology of disease. We noted the emergence of disciplines such as genetic epidemiology, and the forms of surveillance to which this gives rise, such as birth defect registries, and how such surveillance may be facilitated by the electronic storage of information on health and the development of DNA data banks. As we mentioned, discussions about the new genetics occur against the background of persistent concerns about resurgent eugenics. Consequently, proponents take great pains to distance the new genetics from the earlier eugenics, and to emphasize its benefits for the individual and the population as a whole. It seems appropriate then to begin the chapter by examining how the new genetics has been defined and what its contributions are seen to be, before moving on to examine how it is being taken up and applied in pursuit of the public’s health.
