Boundary Making and ‘Good’ Stem Cell Research (SCR) in Mainland China: Including Bioethics, Excluding Debate

Abstract

This study probes into what public Chinese stem cell scientists involve in defining what is ‘good research practice’. Thomas Gieryn in 1983 argued that scientists draw up boundaries between the realm of ‘real science’ and that of ‘pseudoscience’ in order to claim and defend their own territory. The aim was to protect the autonomy of scientific research and to elicit financial support and political backup (Gieryn, American Sociological Review, 48(6), 781–795, 1983). This article builds on, redefines and extends Gieryn's concept of ‘boundary-work’ to apply to and include boundaries between ethical and non-ethical science, while emphasising the global scope of boundary work. It shows how scientists use both ‘science’ and ‘bioethics’ boundaries to demarcate their own territory and to exclude certain publics from debate in the field. By elaborating Gieryn's concept of boundary work in the new and different context of bioethical science regulation, the article shows how Chinese stem cell scientists, by using both kinds of boundaries—between science and pseudoscience and between ethical and non-ethical science—at the same time welcome and abhor bioethical research regulation. This article also indicates the need to understand this extended form of boundary making in terms of global science collaboration and competition. It shows how the self-awareness of scientists as global actors in stem cell science has led to a moral economy of science and ethics involving global boundaries rather than local conditions. Such boundary making does not just function to strengthen group identity and to elicit political support; it is also mobilised to direct and, in many cases, to ward off discussion with bioethicists and the public.

• China
• Stem cell research
• Boundary making
• Research regulation
• Bioethics
• Public discussion

Notes

1 This article has benefited from research support provided by the Netherlands Organisation of Science (NWO) and ESRC (RES-350-27-000s; RES-062-23-0215). I would like to thank the editors for their encouragement and the reviewers for their helpful comments on this article.

2 This need for kosher research is not distributed evenly over all stem cell researchers and their institutes (see Sleeboom-Faulkner 2008).

3 For instance, the UK, Sweden, Israel, Japan, Australia. For discussions on these, see the special issues of Science as Culture, Vol. 17, issues 1 & 4).

4 On 6 October 2001, the ethics committee of the Southern hESR Centre published the ‘General Ethical Guidelines for hESR’ and in 2002, the expert committee of the Ministry of Health published the ‘Proposal for the Supervision of Ethical Principles for hESR’ (10: 175). Both say that research embryos may derive from spare embryos, aborted embryos and cloned embryos. Bioethical regulation for embryo donation include: donation of spare embryos only on a voluntary basis and with informed consent; research is allowed only within 14 days; no return of the blastocyst into the uterus; no use other than for medicine; the coordinator of embryo donation and the researchers may not be one and the same person and the identity of the donor must remain private. The regulation of somatic stem cell nuclear transfer requires oocyte donation to be on a voluntary basis with informed consent. It allows in vitro research within 14 days, prohibits reinsertion to the uterus and only allows the creation of hybrids for research under observation of formal requirements (see Doering 2003; MoH 2003).

5 For a more detailed analysis of stem cell institutions in China, see Sleeboom-Faulkner 2008.

6 An observation corroborated by the experience of a Chinese colleague in the UK.

7 The collaboration between some bioethicists and journalists led to the organisation of satellite conferences for bioethicists to train journalists in ‘fair’ reporting on science.

8 In fact, their appeal has been successful, as on 1 May 2009 regulation came into effect that characterise all stem cell therapies as ‘Category 3’, which are defined as ethically problematic and taken direct responsibility for by the Ministry of Health (Cyranoski 2009: 146–147).

9 The MoH was responsible for the Moh Ethical Principles of Human Assisted Reproductive Technologies (2003) and the MoH Guidelines on Human Assisted Reproductive Technologies (2003), while MoST and MoH issues the Ethical Guidance on Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research (2004) (Zhai 2004). The MoST, however, oversees stem cell research.

10 The name of the location of the office is anonymised.