Discuss the claim that medical intervention in assisted reproduction involves no more than the manipulation, transformation and reconstruction of bioethical entities.
At the heart of the biomedical phenomenon of assisted reproduction lies the recognised capability to circumvent the infertility of intending parents by medical intervention in the process of conception, procreation and pregnancy. Classified under the umbrella category of ‘new reproductive technology’ (NRT), the techniques and procedures for assisted reproduction hold profound implications for the future of human procreation. In light of the dawning use of NRTs, an epoch which developed at the end of the twentieth century, bioethical debate and tension arose amidst the backdrop of technological progress and innovation. The capacity to intervene in the human reproductive cycle, a previously immutable, biological fact, engendered a shift in Western perceptions of procreation, personhood and kin reckoning. In the case of assisted reproduction, bioethical entities may be understood as the tangible manifestations of cultural perceptions of these orders of knowledge. Thus, through the investigation of the effects of reproductive technologies on specific Euro-American knowledge practices, the paradigmatic shifts in the construction and manipulation of bioethical perspectives may be recognised. Within the anthropology of reproduction, the ostensible biological facts of procreation, genealogy and consanguinity operate as fixed anchors of empirical truth which determine relational bonds between individuals. These ‘facts of life’ are modelled on the differences in the roles of men and women in sexual reproduction; the differentiation constitutes the ‘core of the genealogical grid that has defined kinship’ in Western society (Yanagisako 1985: 1). The biogenetic paradigms reducing kinship ties and categories to genealogy reflect generalised Western perceptions of relatedness. According to this theory the genes, cells, tissue and bone which encompass the physical human body all define kinship; the powerful and enduring bonds between related individuals are seen to exist in this manner from conception. In essence, the formulation of kinship is based on the cultural construction of natural facts (Franklin & Ragone 1998). The root of this biological paradigm is the notion of vitality and ‘coming into being’ (Strathern 1993: 15). To a greater or lesser extent, personhood and relationality stem from this understanding of birth and development in Western culture; the order of reproductive knowledge embodies notions of ethics, or in other words, the perceptions and reactions of society to the ‘facts of life’. Thus, it may be considered that the perceived and primordial nature of the biological facts of reproduction is inherent in the formation of bioethics. In order to claim that assisted reproduction involves no more than the manipulation, transformation and reconstruction of bioethical entities, the effects of NRTs on embedded knowledge systems must be explored. In a defining moment for medical science, the world’s first test-tube baby was born in Oldham, Lancashire in 1978. Having ‘failed’, ‘nature’ was given a helping hand by embryologists Edwards and Steptoe, marking the advent of the epoch of assisted reproduction in which nature became a ‘mediated authority’ (Franklin 1993: 135). In the years since, NRT proliferation has been accompanied by the widening of the concept of reproduction in both the biomedical and bioethical spheres. Previously intractable causes of female and male fertility can now be bypassed through medical intervention by treatment services. Operating largely within the private sector, these professional, commercialised services offer developed techniques such as in vitro fertilisation (IVF) and its analogues like gamete intrafallopian transfer (GIFT), the use of donor gametes and embryos, and IVF surrogates in return for considerable sums of money.