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Abstract
Compared to debates in the West, the debate on human embryonic stem cell research (hESR) in Japan is said to be hardly existent. According to established views, the country has no cultural canons that forbid hESR, so a debate on the status of the embryo is hardly relevant to Japanese culture. The existing debate is considered crucial to science policy-makers, though monopolized by the voices of only a few social groups. Three such minority voices are: the Anti-Eugenic Network, a feminist-cum-handicapped movement; the Japanese Association for Spinal Cord Injuries; and a few radical Buddhist sects. These three groups clearly support or oppose hESR. Nevertheless the public debate is carried mainly by political interest groups that amplify and mis-quote the minority voices. These interest groups capitalize on the hopes placed on hESR in promoting financial and political support, at the same time as they aim to cure disease. The past experiences of the three social groups with Japanese politics on health are linked to promises, risk perception and doubts about the future of hESR.
Acknowledgements
This article has benefited from research support provided by the Netherlands Organization of Science (NWO) and the ESRC (RES-350-27-0002). I would like to thank the reviewers and Alex Faulkner for their helpful comments on this article.
Notes
1. As this article aims to discuss the dynamics of public discussion, and not persons, the interviewees in this article have been anonymized. A thorough search, however, could yield the names of some of the interviewees as they may be well-known.
2. Note that I do not claim that other countries, such as the UK or the USA have experienced a public debate in the sense that the general public has been involved in a manner satisfactory to all interested parties.
3. The Millennium Project, set up under PM Keizo Obuchi, included more than 20 universities and several foundations, consortia, and public and private research institutions in an initiative to develop the life sciences. It was sponsored jointly by the Science and Technology Agency (STA), Ministry of Education, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (MOHLW), and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI).
4. The three ministries that issued the guidelines were the MEXT, the MOHLW, and the METI.
5. Researchers must explain the prospect and nature of their research proposal, prove their proficiency and experience in using stem cells from other species, name the principal researchers and regularly submit reports on their progress. Furthermore, applicants must identify those in charge of the internal ethical review, who judge the criteria governing the distribution and handling of fertilized eggs and the cell lines created from them (Harris, Citation2002).
6. See http://www.oomoto.or.jp/English/Enbiet/Escells.html for the Oomoto sect's view on hESR.
7. For a review of treatment possibilities, see the website of the ICCP (International Campaign for Spinal Cord Injuries Programme), available at: www.campaignforcure.org.
8. See the views of the Eugenics network, available at: http://cat.zero.ad.jp/yunet/index.html.
9. These views derive from the website of the Anti-Eugenics Network (http://www.cat.zero.ad.jp/yunet/sentan2.html) and the page with documents submitted to various hESR institutes and the MEXT. Available at: http://www.cat.zero.ad.jp/yunet/sentansiryoes.html (last accessed 5 December 2006).
10. This statement refers to various issues: one is the prohibition for children to donate their organs. As a consequence, children in need of a transplant go to the US. A second problem is the extremely low number of available organs for transplantation in Japan. Many Japanese are thought to go to China to receive kidney transplants (Coonan & McNeill, Citation2006).
11. Pure Land Shin Buddhism is a branch of Pure Land Buddhism, which in turn is a branch of Mahayana Buddhism. The Pure Land Sect (Joodo Shinshu) is practised mainly in Japan (Shimazono, Citation2007).
12. According to a well-known hES scientist, Prof. L (interview, 1 May 2006), the damaging effect of regulation on hESR progress is expressed in the fact that internationally Japan publishes one out of every three articles on mouse ES research, but none at all on hESR (cf. Biotechnology, April 2006).