Dept. of Political Science, University of Waterloo

Colin Farrelly is Assistant Professor in the Dept. of Political Science (cross-appointed with Philosophy) at the University of Waterloo.  Colin is a political philosopher and his current research interests include the ethical, legal and social implications of the genetic revolution.  His publications in this area include articles in The American Journal of Bioethics, Journal of Medical Ethics, Bioethics and Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal.  Colin is currently writing a book on genetic justice.

In this paper I consider the issue of regulating (non-medical uses of) preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) from the second-order social theory advanced by Amy Gutmann and Dennis Thompson (1996, 2004). Deliberative democracy does not champion the priority of one particular substantive (e.g. liberty, equality, etc.) or procedural value (e.g. democracy); rather it acknowledges a plurality of such values.  Furthermore, it seeks to find a reasonable balance among these values in a way that takes seriously what Gutmann and Thompson call “provisionality”.  I outline a trade-off Model that captures these requirements in the context of reproductive freedom and regulating access to non-medical uses of PGD.