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| Semester | fall semester 2012 |
| Course frequency | Once only |
| Lecturers |
Christoph Rehmann-Sutter (christoph.rehmann-sutter@unibas.ch)
Tenzin Wangmo (tenzin.wangmo@unibas.ch, Assessor) |
| Content | In many ways, explicitly or implicitly, bioethics is dealing with political issues and is itself a politically relevant feature of risk societies. Some of these issues, for instance, regulatory and governance issues, are explicitly political, and the procedures of problem solving must fit into institutionalized decision-making structures of the public sphere. Drawing on cases and experiences from national advisory committees and also of international bodies, such as the United Nations or the Council of Europe, the seminar will explore the potential and the limits of institutionalized politics for bioethics. What problems can arise at the interface of the moral and the political? Which role can (or should) bioethics adopt in such societies? How should bioethics be “staged” in the public sphere, in order to strengthen and not to hinder democratic agency? With a view to the history of political philosophy, key concepts of the political in bioethics, such as “public sphere”, “participation”, “democratic agency”, “risk society”, “ethics”, “consensus and dissent”, – and “the political” shall be discussed and clarified. Other political aspects of bioethics however are implicitly political. Many authors for instance have criticized a politically naïve bioethics to become instrumentalized by powerful players such as governments or the techno-scientific complex to produce legitimacy and public acceptance for controversial projects, such as gene and stem cell research. Is bioethics in itself a political factor? Is the topic of bioethics politically sensitive? Is it intrinsically political, what bioethics does? And what is it that makes it so politically sensitive? How should political sensitivity be cultivated in national, transnational and cosmopolitical issues? In the seminar we will refer to classical and contemporary cases such as the “Singer debate” in Germany, assisted suicide in Switzerland, the UN declaration on human cloning, off-shoring of clinical trials to developing countries, or human enhancement biotechnology to fight global warming. We will confront them with key concepts of governance theory and political philosophy, such as Michel Foucault’s “bio-politics”, Michael Walzer’s “reiterative universalism”, Judith Butler’s “ethical violence”, or Iris Marion Young’s concept of “structural injustice”. The aim is to discuss what we can learn from them in order to better understand the implicitly and explicitly political sides of bioethics. After gaining insights concerning the development of biomedical ethics particularly from the political and philosophical perspectives, we will use students’ current research projects to understand the current state of the field. As part of this block-course, students will have the chance to present and discuss their research projects. Presentations are a platform for all biomedical ethics students to learn about different cutting-edge research projects that are undergoing at the two Institutes of Biomedical Ethics in Switzerland. This presentation and discussions of research projects will take place on September 6 and 7, 2012. Students are expected to present a background of their research project, its importance to the current field of biomedical ethics, their research methods, study results, and discussion of their findings. Students will have 35 minutes for their presentation followed by 15 minutes of Q&A. |
| Learning objectives | OBJECTIVES OF THIS COURSE ARE TO: 1. understand the development of bioethics in Switzerland and worldwide, 2. provide opportunity for all students to learn about each other's works, 3. ensure networking of students with experts in the field, and 4. have a good mixture of recreational and academic exchange. |
| Bibliography | Course literature will be sent to all participants by July 15, 2012 |
| Admission requirements | The course is open to PhD students from the Institute for Biomedical Ethics at the University of Basel and PhD students from the Institute of Biomedical Ethics at the University of Zurich. If there are additional spaces left, the course will also be opened to Master's students at the University of Basel. |
| Course application | University of Basel students are expected to register for this couse using MONA. Students from the University of Zurich must send an email to both Dr. Wangmo (Tenzin.Wangmo@unibas.ch) and inform Dr. Effy Vayena (vayena@ethik.uzh.ch). |
| Language of instruction | English |
| Use of digital media | No specific media used |
| Interval | Weekday | Time | Room |
|---|
No dates available. Please contact the lecturer.
| Modules |
Aufbaumodul (Teil C) (Transfakultäre Querschnittsprogramme im freien Kreditpunkte-Bereich) Lehrveranstaltungen Promotionsfach Medizin- und Gesundheitsethik (PhD subject: Medizin- und Gesundheitsethik) Modul Praktische Philosophie (Master's degree subject: Philosophy) |
| Assessment format | continuous assessment |
| Assessment details | Students are expected to attend on all five days. Students will do an hours presentation during the course where they are expected to discuss their current research work in Biomedical ethics. They will be expected to devote at least 30 hours to course readings distributed before the course meeting. They will actively engage in course discussions. These criteria will be used to assess student participation and will result in a Pass/Fail grade. |
| Assessment registration/deregistration | Reg.: course registration; dereg.: teaching staff |
| Repeat examination | no repeat examination |
| Scale | Pass / Fail |
| Repeated registration | no repetition |
| Responsible faculty | Faculty of Medicine |
| Offered by | Institut für Bio- und Medizinethik |