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In the UK, the intellectual basis of legal framework governing the creation, use and storage of in vitro embryos for reproduction and research has not been revisited for over thirty years. This book explores the reasons behind this 'legal stasis', and considers ways in which we can move beyond it.
List of contents
Introduction; Part I. Into Liminality: 1. The evolution of 'the embryo' in law: a matter of process?; 2. 'The embryo' in law today: the human fertilisation and embryology act 1990 and beyond; 3. From process to purgatory: moving beyond legal stasis; Part II. Through Liminality: 4. Navigating legal purgatory: the otherness of embryos; 5. A liminal lens; Part III. Out of liminality: 6. A context based approach; 7. Looking forward: the 14-day rule, in vitro gametogenesis, and ectogenesis; Conclusion; Bibliography.
About the author
Catriona A. W. McMillan is a Senior Research Fellow in Medical Law and Ethics at the University of Edinburgh. Her research focuses on the intersection of health law, ethics, and society, particularly the regulation of reproduction, and advances in health technologies.
Summary
In the UK, the intellectual basis of legal framework governing the creation, use and storage of in vitro embryos for reproduction and research has not been revisited for over thirty years. This book explores the reasons behind this 'legal stasis', and considers ways in which we can move beyond it.
Additional text
'Using two innovative lenses - liminality and the gothic - in this book McMillan addresses the place and construction of 'the embryo' in law. Her penetrating socio-legal analysis draws on the science and technology studies and anthropological literatures to persuasively argue that there is no singular 'embryo' in law, but instead multiple (unacknowledged) ones. Her incisive analysis emphasises the significance of thresholds, boundaries, and processes for understanding law and legal gaps regarding these. She insists that it is 'time to break the legal stalemate surrounding embryos in vitro'. The book is a call to arms - for both regulators and legal scholars - to take context and process seriously. Readers will be left in no doubt that this is a call we should all heed.' Muireann Quigley, Professor of Law, Medicine, and Technology, Birmingham Law School
