The New Old Colonialism

The question of how law should regulate the manipulation of the human genome or germline is inflected by the interconnected, intersectional parrying among different systems of moral value. Contract law and constitutional law reflect two poles of interest: the transactional aspects of market valuation and the relational aspects of the web of life that acknowledge "pricelessness." In the decades from the initial decoding of the human genome in 2000 to the emergence of CRISPR technologies, powerful companies and powerful individuals now all but own the fate of our species and the health of our planet. The destructive effects of the realignments we are undergoing are still largely invisible (if not for long) and largely unresponsive to conventional checks.