Frankfurt Master Colloquium on Health, Body and Biotechnology

Description

Where Audit and Hospitality Meet: Biomedical Research Governance in the Asia-Pacific Region In examining practices in the governance of biomedical research, anthropologists have begun to pay attention to the social dynamics of ethics review processes. Central to how biomedical research is governed worldwide, ethics review committees meet to assess the validity of proposed studies and evaluate a range of ethical issues associated with conducting trials of drugs and technologies on human subjects. As clinical trials have expanded over the last decade to become increasingly multi-sited, more ethics review committees have been established around the world. This Colloquium presentation offers anthropological insight into the capacity building activities of recently established committees the Asia-Pacific region. In order to be recognised as part of the governing apparatus of biomedicine, committees are choosing to train and over 100 to date have undergone a quality assurance process called the “Survey”. Conducted by members of the WHO funded Forum of Ethics Review Committees of Asia and the Pacific, Surveys borrow techniques from the worlds of audit, interviewing, observing and assessing paperwork. However, as they carry out their work, the Survey team has to negotiate the fine line between critique oriented at quality, and supportive acts which maintain the bonds of friendship which the Forum’s network is built upon. By drawing together contemporary research on audit cultures with longstanding anthropological interests in hospitality, the presentation puts forward the case for the place of ethnographic enquiry and anthropological reflection in these processes at the heart of the governance of biomedicine.

Period	24 Jun 2015
Event type	Seminar
Location	Frankfurt, GermanyShow on map