The ESIL-SEDI Interest Group on International Bio Law wants to be a forum for discussion, networking and joint activities within an emerging sub-field of International Law.

Why an Interest Group on International Bio Law?

Clinical trials in developing countries, human cloning for therapeutic purposes, experimentation on human genome, nanoscience reserarch and nanotechnologic products, byotechnological paents… all these new aspects of the life sciences have in common their impact on human beings -individually and as a species- and their lack of international regulation. States feel at ease forbidding, allowing with restrictions or assuming a “laissez-faire” approach towards these developments at a national level, whereas they struggle because there is not a common normative approach for them. In this context International Law can and indeed must have a say: the International Bio Law Interest Group.

International Bio Law is not constrained to the biotechnological inventions on environment and the eventual consequences on human health (e.g. GMOs). Nor is it compelled to assume the Human Rights legal language but easily moves across all areas of International Law. It is by no means conditioned by moral or religious beliefs. International Bio Law has emerged in the face of new technological advances and discoveries in the life sciences which impact on human beings individually and as a species. International Bio Law is calling for a specific and autonomous methodology according to a comprehensive framework of analysis to be carried out by a new epistemic community among ius internationalists, with a geographical and gender balance. Please, join the group.

The idea of International Bio Law is not completely new. The International Law Association, for instance, has counted on the works of a Committee on the International Law on Biotechnology, up to 2010, with some Reports issued in 2006 (Toronto), 2008 (Rio) and 2010 (The Hague).

Which are the purpose and justification of the ESIL Interest Group on International Bio Law?

The main purpose of this Interest Group is to clarify what is International Bio Law as an emerging sub-field of International Law (actors, sources, domains of action and means of solution for controversies) and as a discipline of study (concept, researching methodology, bibliography and references, schools of thoughts, etc.) In this sense, the International Bio Law is not limited to some fields already linked (human rights, environment, international trade regulations) but it is open to other areas (feminism and International Bio Law, Terrorism, Peace and Security and International Bio Law). The justification for this ESIL Interest Group is evident and already said: International Bio Law is calling for a specific and autonomous methodology according to a comprehensive framework of analysis to be carried out by a new epistemic community among ius internationalists, with a geographical and gender balance.