Assisted Reproductive Technologies and Religious Values

<p>This study examines the regulation of pre-implantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) in Germany. PGD, an assisted reproductive technology (ART), was invented in the 1980s and involves testing human embryonic cells for genetic issues as part of in-vitro fertilization (IVF) treatments. Beginning in the 1980s, Germany instituted one of the most restrictive ART policies in the world that outlawed PGD altogether. Importantly, the German policy case includes a federal court of justice ruling involving a fertility doctor who turned himself in to the police to disclose that he had violated existing law. The court’s decision necessitated a parliamentary revision of the federal law that, since 2011, allows PGD under certain circumstances. The in-depth analysis of PGD regulation in Germany between 1989 and 2011 concluded that the policy process was influenced in three important ways: First, it was marked by the institutionalized legal power of the German judiciary branch to change laws; second, it was shaped by existing legal frameworks in Germany regulating human reproduction, which defined the status of a human embryo; and third, it was impacted by the German institutional guarantee that members of parliament may vote on laws based on their personal and moral beliefs, not bound by their political party’s position. This is of particular importance because ART policy making involves questions surrounding the legal status of a human embryo and because Germany’s political party system includes two Christian-based political parties that were in power for almost two-thirds of Germany’s postwar government.</p>