Ben Gilna
Funded by the Research Council of Norway.

Relevance
One of the looming issues in new applications of biotechnology, and some visions of nanotechnology, is how to address technologies whose intended mode of action explicitly involves their autonomous establishment, dispersal and sometimes reproduction in the environment. Unlike a ‘side effect’ of an otherwise contained technology, the intentional design of agents designed for this kind of dissemination invokes novel considerations of ethical responsibilities, moral and legal culpabilities (e.g. liability and redress), and the pragmatics of governance. In particular, there is a great challenge in dealing with cross-border spread – what may be a (democratically or otherwise) legitimated risk exposure in one nation will not necessarily be legitimate in another. How does one govern this? Do existing international legal frameworks indicate how this challenge might be handled? How does a sovereign nation deliberate with non-member citizens on an issue without compromising its indigenous responsibilities? What can attitudes in different nations (or other divisions) tell us about the cultural scripts at work there (e.g. robust nationalism or conscientious member-state)? What provisions for dialogue and deliberation are there?

We propose to address these issues with reference to three related and intensifying technological efforts:

• genetically modified biocontrol agents for the lethal control of problematic (non-human) populations,
• genetically modified agents to reduce the reproductive ability of problematic (non-human) populations, and
• genetically modified agents for the control of disease in wildlife reservoirs and vectors.

These efforts use novel and controversial technical means to deal with biological entities that often span political borders – these agents are explicitly designed to spread and/or endure in the environment remote from day-to-day human management. They address ‘high-stake’ and urgent issues for humans and the ecology that are riddled with uncertainty and complexity – technological interventions into exemplarily ‘post-normal’ domains. Some projects are in advanced stages of development, several at the point of field trials. It is highly likely that the first applications of these technologies will set important precedents for science, policy and culture that will shape developments in years to come. In all cases, both ‘problem’ and ‘solution’ are constructed in different ways by different groups, and in some aspects are the source of significant controversy and political action.

Our synthesis will draw conclusions for these particular technologies, but more generally address the particular challenge of governance of self-dispersing technologies, opportunities and limitations on deliberation in cross-border applications (often with very disadvantaged members of the international community), and chart some of the metaphors, expectations and narratives that are in circulation to navigate these prospects.