Going with the Flow: Moving Cells and Changing Values in Biomedical Practice

Abstract

Science and technology studies have devoted considerable attention to the economic implications of biomedical technoscience. This article enriches these studies by offering a new reading of several strands of literature to explore how the valuation processes of gifts, commodities, and assets are intertwined in practice. We derive this approach from an empirical analysis of autologous blood donation in the case of a cell therapy called “extracorporeal photopheresis.” Combining ethnographic fieldwork with semi-structured interviews, focus groups, and document analysis in a cell therapy laboratory at a Belgian university hospital, we followed cells in motion from their original donation to their reinjection into the body, observing the practices that constitute and shape their value. We find that the various qualifications as “gift,” “commodity,” or “asset” that cells acquire, accumulate, or relinquish, as well as the consequences of these qualifications, are accessible only by observing the valuation practices that configure living processes. Our analysis highlights the interrelations between the economic forms that living entities can take and rejects the idea of a watertight boundary between them. By emphasizing the entanglement of logics specific to donation, commodification, or assetization, we contribute to linking the value shifts observed at the level of the laboratory to broader capitalist transformations.