Creating clones, kids & chimera: liberal democratic compromise at the crossroads.

The objective of this article is to find middle ground between the supporters and opponents of biotechnology by perpetuating the existing legal compromise pertaining to the complete range of health and welfare doctrines relevant to the biotechnological industry. The author aspires neither to add to nor detract from this liberal democratic consensus, but to preserve its constitutive balance between positivism and natural law and over-regulation and under-regulation in the hopes of stabilizing new political fault lines developing around the few biotechnological innovations already grabbing headlines. The most feasible solution is to extend the existing liberal democratic compromise with respect to equal protection, reproductive rights, the First Amendment, human subject experimentation, patent law, and parental rights. This includes banning or monopolizing certain biotechnologies and extending substantive special respect to the ex vivo living human embryo. Biotechnology must not be left to regulate itself. ********** I am thy creature, and I will be even mild and docile to my natural lord and king if thou will also perform thy part, that which thou owest me. (1) Most agree that biotechnology is leading to a revolution in medicine. Less appreciated is the challenge biotechnology poses to the prevailing liberal democratic consensus pertaining to health and welfare. Biotechnology necessarily impinges upon key health and welfare doctrines at the core of our collective understanding of what it means to advance personal autonomy, self-determination, liberty, and equality within a market economy. Supporters are confident that the biotechnological industry will affirm these values and channel potentially life-saving biotechnological innovations in directions harmless to all but the human embryo. (2) They favor essentially a self-regulated industry, where medical professionals decide whether and when to create or modify human clones, kids, and chimera. (3) In contrast, opponents of biotechnology fear the natural inclination of the market is to lead us toward " the dehumanized hell of Brave New World." (4) They assert a fundamental, deontological right to ban or strictly limit nearly all forms of biotechnological research. The modest objective of this Article is to find middle ground between these camps by perpetuating the existing legal compromise pertaining to the complete range of health and welfare doctrines relevant to the biotechnological industry This Article aspires neither to add to nor detract from this liberal democratic consensus, but to preserve its constitutive balance between positivism and natural law and over-regulation and under-regulation in the hopes of stabilizing new political fault lines developing around the few biotechnological innovations already grabbing headlines. (5) Part I explores human cloning and two other key biotechnologies that will frame the political debate, including genetic screening and genetic engineering. To provide an historical political economic perspective, we compare their development with a standard model of technological change embracing invention, innovation, and diffusion. This section concludes that biotechnology is leading to a more radical transformation of the political economy than any previous cluster of innovations, because it will impact not merely our tools, but our species. Part II identifies the primary international and national legal regimes that genetic screening, human cloning, and genetic engineering will either radically alter or which will regulate them, including equal protection, reproductive rights, the First Amendment, human subject experimentation rules, patent law, and parental rights. From the constitutional and other legal principles underpinning these regimes we illuminate the contours of the existing liberal democratic consensus. Part III wrestles with how to extend this consensus to the biotechnological industry without modifying the existing legal regimes. …