IJFAB: International Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics

Rethinking Reprogenetics by Immaculada de Melo-Martin has at its heart a desire to spark discussion about the foundations of our right to reproduce. While many of the arguments are familiar in feminist ethics, de Melo-Martin's text is a useful addition in that she is focusing on the development and application of genetic technology toward reproductive ends, including the ends of transhumanism. Particularly, de Melo-Martin is skeptical about claims that genetic reproduction is a need or right deserving of social resources. This is particularly an issue when genetic reproduction requires public resources to do it or as a consequence of it. She raises questions about whether the desire to have genetically related children is truly authentic and sufficiently robust to justify the development and use of technology and resources to further this end. For de Melo-Martin, technology is the flashy, attention-grabbing, quick fix that distracts from larger issues that need to be addressed.

Feminist critique of reproductive technology is not new. Susan Wolf's (1996) Feminism and Bioethics: Beyond Reproduction sums up the fact that reproductive issues have occupied a great deal of attention in feminist bioethics. To list them all would be beyond the focus of this book review. However, de Melo-Martin's text fits squarely within cultural themes of previous analysis of reproductive technology by feminist bioethicists. There is a distrust of the application of technology per se and to women's work and bodies in particular. This includes the influence of social forces on women's decisions and desires, and the desire to expand the dialogue of bioethics beyond the strictures of the individual clinician-patient relationship to consider impacts on social justice and the environment. Finally, de Melo-Martin joins several feminists who criticize the application of autonomy in a world where freedom and responsibility have lost much of their connection with each other, leading to unfair burdens and injustice.

De Melo-Martin's text adds to this rich literature by applying critiques of genetic parenthood, commodification of gametes and gestational surrogates, and other aspects of reproduction that have been more fully developed by others to her challenge to the development of and support for reprogenetic technologies. She references their work and builds on it. Specifically, she is [End Page 151] responding directly to the work of several prominent authors on this subject who champion the use and development of reproductive technology, especially that which has the potential to change or manipulate the genetics of gametes or embryos used for reproduction. (35) Her most pointed criticism is directed at the views espoused by John Roberston, Julian Savulescu, and John Harris. In his influential text, Children of Choice, Robertson (1994) defines procreative liberty as "the freedom to have children or to avoid having them" (22). He then develops an argument in support of the right for people to use reproductive technology if it is necessary for them to reproduce based on their circumstances (29-42). Savulescu (2007) has argued for the principle of procreative beneficence, defining it as "the principle of selecting the best child of the possible children one could have" (284). In this argument, Savulescu is not requiring that people use in virtro fertilization (IVF) to be able to use pre-implantation genetic diagnosis (PGD). Rather, he is saying that if there is the opportunity to choose which embryo to implant, one should choose the embryo that appears to have the best chance for a good quality of life, as opposed to leaving things up to chance (287). In "Germline Modification and the Burden of Human Existence," John Harris (2016) has made arguments similar to Savulescu, going so far as to say that natural reproduction is as risky as reproduction using reprogenetic technology, if not more so. He says that "we have always to decide not what is safe but what is safe enough, given the balance of risks and benefits," and that reproductive risk falls on all potential offspring without...