Human Enhancement Technologies: Understanding Governance, Policies and Regulatory Structures in the Global Context

The 10 articles in this special edition were presented at the international conference Human Enhancement Technologies: Understanding Governance, Policies and Regulatory Structures in the Global Context in Singapore, held on 7–8 June 2012. The conference was one of the activities within the EPOCH project: Ethics in Public Policy Making: The Case of Human Enhancement, funded by the European Commission under the 7th Framework Programme.⁴

We found that questions about access, equity and equality, and how enhancement technologies may affect different groups in expected and unexpected ways, were raised by way of three areas: the human body, the human brain, and policy. Yet, when it came to understanding the ethical content of global policies, a number of issues cut across these areas. It is this idea of possible global convergence that we focus on in this Editorial.

There were four questions that we set out to address:

1. 1. What are the principles of “good governance”?

2. 2. What are the debates about, where technologies are more or less in common reach of the public?

3. 3. How to manage international value differences?

4. 4. How will developments outside Europe impact EU governance policies?

These questions were more or less addressed during the conference—but it would be wrong to say that we came away with definitive answers to them. In this Editorial, then, we can only hint at resolution, as we tackle these questions out of turn and reflect on the articles in this special edition of the ABR.

Defining Enhancement

An agreed definition of “enhancement” remains elusive, and this is often an obstacle in debates about technologies. In this issue, definitions and assumptions about enhancement are made; so it seems appropriate that we lay some groundwork.

For some, most notably John Harris, enhancement is good for you!⁵ And this opens up a world in which individuals are free to pursue their own ideas of happiness with no more concern than to avoid harming others. Yet, in the first part of Capps et al.’s article, they find that there is a world of difference between an a priori good and a judgement made from experience. The authors claim many libertarian arguments boil down to a presumption that all agents share a view about enhancement. This, however, “is far from certain given the multitude of technologies under discussion, and how each technology will benefit (or harm) inseparable lives”. Calvin Ho likewise finds that the enhancement/therapy distinction fails because a “state may not be shared by another person in a different culture or at a different time, just as an attempt to heal now, could be construed as modification or augmentation by another person”. This leads Ho to a potentially far reaching conclusion: although he limits his analysis to enhancement technologies in aesthetic medicine, it is possible that all technologies will require a broader and multi-fronted regulatory approach that encompasses professional and social norms, as well as considerations of equity. Clearly then, the idea that enhancement is little more than a choice requires further substantiation; choices cut across interpersonal relationships, cultures, history and geographical and political borders.

In fact, if we’re going to let liberty do all the work, then there’s little need for regulation or for ethical reflection. This does not seem like a place to start if one is looking for principles of “good governance”—this is more than giving people liberties and hoping that the invisible hand will do the job, but has also to do with safety and justice. If we are to take questions of equity seriously, then a richer understanding of governance—one that appeals to different cultures—is required.

Some pro-enhancement advocates emphasise a moral value in “enhancement”, i.e., in the goal to “improve”.⁶ “Enhancement” and therapy ⁷ share the same moral purpose: the pursuit of an improvement of a current reference state. Others argue in favour of a normative distinction between “therapy” and “enhancement”, emphasising a moral value of “therapy” which is embedded [End...