The 1998 announcement by American researcher Richard Seed that he intended to clone a human person for reproductive reasons created a large amount of journalistic attention and controversy in the Danish mass media. Developing a theoretical framework inspired by Bruno Latour, this paper analyzes the mass mediated articulation of this announcement as an exploration of the socially viable interpretations of human cloning within the controversial field of biotechnology. An inductive analysis of scripts employed by four national newspapers identifies four main scripts: scientific education, pragmatic regulation, absolute resistance and fatalistic irony. All scripts generally reject the idea of human cloning, but they are found to represent distinctively different forms of social response corresponding to the classification of different cultural dialogues on risk.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Allan, S. (2002) Media, Risk and Science. Buckingham: Open University Press .
2.
Andersen, I.-E. and Jæger, B. (1999) “Danish Participatory Models. Scenario Workshops and Consensus Conferences: Towards More Democratic Decision-making,”Science and Public Policy26: 331-340 .
3.
Bauer, M. and Gaskell, G. (eds.) (2002) Biotechnology: The Making of a Global Controversy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press .
4.
Berkowitz, D. (ed.) (1997) Social Meanings of News. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications .
5.
Condit, C.M. (1999) The Meanings of the Gene. Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press .
6.
Douglas, M. (1996) Risk and Blame: Essays in Cultural Theory. London: Routledge .
7.
Douglas, M. (1997) “The Depoliticization of Risk,” in R. Ellis and M. Thompson (eds) Culture Matters: Essays in Honor of Aaron Wildavsky, pp. 121-132. Boulder, CO: Westview Press .
8.
Douglas, M. and Wildavsky, A. (1983) Risk and Culture. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press .
9.
Durant, J. (1999) “Participatory Technology Assessment and the Democratic Model of the Public Understanding of Science,”Science and Public Policy26: 313-319 .
10.
Einsiedel, E.F. , Allansdottir, A. , Allum, N. , Bauer, M. , Berthomier, A. , Chatjouli, A. , de Cheveigné, S. , Downey, R. , Gutteling, J.M. , Kohring, M. , Leonarz, M. , Manzoli, F. , Olofsson, A. , Przestalski, A. , Rusanen, T. , Seifert, F. , Stathopoulou, A. and Wagner, W. (2002) “Brave New Sheep—the Clone Named Dolly,” in M. Bauer and G. Gaskell (eds.) Biotechnology: The Making of a Global Controversy, pp. 313-347. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press .
11.
Engelhardt, T. and Caplan, A. (eds.) (1987) Scientific Controversies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press .
12.
Friedman, S.M. , Dunwoody, S. and Rogers, C.S. (1999) Communicating Uncertainty: Media Coverage of New and Controversial Science. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates .
13.
Gregory, J. and Miller, S. (1998) Science In Public: Communication, Culture, and Credibility. New York: Plenum Trade .
14.
Gunter, B. , Kinderlerer, J. and Beyleveld, D. (1999) “The Media and Public Understanding of Biotechnology: A Survey of Scientists and Journalists,”Science Communication20: 373-394 .
15.
Gutteling, J.M. , Olofsson, A. , Kohring, M. , Fjæstad, B. , Goerke, A. , Bauer, M. and Rusanen, T. (2002) “Media Coverage 1973-1996: Trends and Dynamics,” in M. Bauer and G. Gaskell (eds.) Biotechnology. The Making of a Global Controversy, pp. 95-128. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press .
16.
Habermas, J. (1991) The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: an Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press .
17.
Hopkins, P.D. (1998) “How Popular Media Represent Cloning as an Ethical Problem,”Hastings Center Report28: 6-14 .
18.
Irwin, A. and Michael, M. (2003) Science, Social Theory and Public Knowledge. Maidenhead: Open University Press .
19.
Irwin, A. and Wynne, B. (1996) Misunderstanding Science?Cambridge: Cambridge University Press .
20.
Jelsøe, E. , Lassen, J. , Mortensen, A.T. , Frederiksen, H. and Kamara, M.W. (1998) “Denmark,” in J. Durant , G. Gaskell and M. Bauer (eds.) Biotechnology in the Public Sphere, pp. 29-42. London: Science Museum .
21.
Joss, S. (1999) “Introduction. Public Participation in Science and Technology Policy- and Decision-making—Ephemeral Phenomenon or Lasting Change?,”Science and Public Policy26: 290-293 .
22.
Knudsen, A. (1996) Her går det godt, send flere penge [Everything is Fine, Send More Money]. Aarhus: Gyldendal .
23.
Latour, B. (1987) Science in Action. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press .
24.
Latour, B. (1999) Pandora’s Hope. London: Harvard University Press .
25.
Locke, S. (1999) “Golem Science and the Public Understanding of Science: From Deficit to Dilemma,”Public Understanding of Science8: 75-92 .
26.
Miller, S. (2001) “Public Understanding of Science at the Crossroads,”Public Understanding of Science10: 115-120 .
27.
Ministry of the Environment (1984) Fremskridtets Pris [The Price of the Future]. Copenhagen: Indenrigsministeriet .
28.
Mulkay, M. (1993) “Rhetorics of Hope and Fear in the Great Embryo Debate,”Social Studies of Science23: 721-742 .
29.
Mulkay, M. (1994) “Science and Family in the Great Embryo Debate,”Sociology28: 699-715 .
30.
Mulkay, M. (1997) The Embryo Research Debate. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press .
31.
Nelkin, D. (1995a) “Science Controversies: The Dynamics of Public Disputes in the United States,” in S. Jasanoff , G.E. Markle , J.C. Petersen and T.J. Pinch (eds.) Handbook of Science and Technology Studies, pp. 444-456. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications .
32.
Nelkin, D. (1995b) Selling Science: How the Press Covers Science and Technology. New York: W.H. Freeman and Company .
33.
Nelkin, D. and Lindee, M.S. (1995) The DNA Mystique: The Gene as a Cultural Icon. New York: W.H. Freeman and Company .
34.
Neresini, F. (2000) “And Man Descended from the Sheep: the Public Debate on Cloning in the Italian Press,”Public Understanding of Science9: 359-382 .
35.
Nisbet, M.C. and Lewenstein, B.V. (2002) “Biotechnology and the American Media,”Science Communication23: 359-391 .
36.
Nowotny, H. , Scott, P. and Gibbons, M. (2001) Re-thinking Science: Knowledge and the Public in an Age of Uncertainty. Cambridge: Polity Press .
37.
Pedersen, O.K. , Bjerregaard, R. , Elming, P. , Hansen, S. , Hummelmose, H. , Hoejland, P. and Larsen, J. (1994) Demokratiets lette tilstand: Syv beslutningstagere om Danmark og fremtid [The Lightness of Democracy: Seven Decision-makers on Denmark and the Future]. Copenhagen: Spektrum .
38.
Priest, S.H. (2001a) A Grain of Truth: The Media, the Public, and Biotechnology. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield .
39.
Priest, S.H. (2001b) “Cloning: a Study in News Production,”Public Understanding of Science10: 59-69 .
40.
Stocking, S.H. (1999) “How Journalists Deal With Scientific Uncertainty,” in S.M. Friedman , S. Dunwoody and C.S. Rogers (eds.) Communicating Uncertainty: Media Coverage of New and Controversial Science, pp. 23-42. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates .
41.
Thompson, M. , Ellis, R. and Wildavsky, A. (1990) Cultural Theory. Boulder, CO: Westview Press .
42.
Turney, J. (1998) Frankenstein’s Footsteps. New Haven: Yale University Press .
43.
Van Dijck, J. (1998) Imagenation: Popular Images of Genetics. London: Macmillan .
