As an epistemic community, bioethics is divided by the different professional backgrounds of its members and united by the common legitimating function they may be called upon to perform in the consideration of ethical issues surrounding the governance of biobanks.
Despite, or some would argue because of, its internal divisions, bioethics has acquired considerable political value because it is able to incorporate the different interests of citizens, science and industry within an apparently neutral discursive domain. As ethical experts, bioethicists have been given pride of place in the regulatory apparatus of biobanks and replaced the increasingly defunct technocratic model of scientific self-regulation.
Difficult issues of citizenship rights associated with the collection and storage of genetic data in terms of informed consent, confidentiality and anonymity, withdrawal, access and ownership have been brought within the remit of international and national bioethics committees, duly discussed and policy recommendations produced and implemented
Spanish 
Chinese 
Russian 
German 
French 
Japanese 
Portuguese 
Hindi