How Ethical Systems Change: Eugenics, the Final Solution, Bioethics

Sheldon Ekland-Olson, Julie Beicken

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2012
• eBook ISBN: 9781136476181
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Sociology
• Index: Social Sciences

Mandatory sterilization laws enacted in dozens of states coast-to-coast and approved by the U.S. Supreme Court formed the initial pillar for what became the Final Solution. Following WWII, there was renewed interest in a more inclusive view of social worth and the autonomy of the individual. Social movements were launched to secure broad-based revisions in civil and human rights. This book is based on a hugely popular undergraduate course taught at the University of Texas, and is ideal for those interested in science-based policy, the social construction of social worth, social problems, and social movements.

This book is an excerpt from a larger text, Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Decides?, http://www.routledge.com/9780415892476/

Glossary/Index

A

ABA (American Breeders’ Association) 8, 13–14

abortion 41, 42, 46, 55, 56–57, 58, 60

“Act for the Prevention of Idiocy” 17–18

Admissions Advisory Committee 37 AES (American Eugenics Society) 8, 22

Alexander, Leo 35, 36, 43, 47

Alexander, Shana 37, 38

American Genetics Association 8, 14

American Society for Artificial Internal Organs 36

autonomy: a person’s ability to make his/her own decision. In relation to medicine and ethics, the concept refers to physicians or researchers providing patients or subjects with the most accurate information so that they can make the best decisions for themselves and resist coercion. In addition to beneficence and justice, one of the three principles of bioethics written in The Belmont Report. 3, 18, 25, 26, 33, 57, 58, 59, 60

B

Barr, M. W. 12

Beauchamp, Tom 58, 59

Beecher, Henry K. 42–44, 45, 47, 52, 53

Bell, Alexander Graham 10

Bell, James H. See Buck v. Bell

Belmont Report, The 44, 58–60

beneficence: more than engaging in discretionary kindness or charity, beneficence refers to the obligation to maximize benefits and minimize harms. In addition to autonomy and justice, beneficence was one of the three principles to guide bio-ethics written in The Belmont Report. 18, 58, 59, 60

Bennis, Warren 52 Bernard, Christiaan 44, 45, 54

Better Baby Contests 22

Binet, Alfred 14

bioethics: the discipline that explores issues of morality and ethics in relation to science, medicine, and technology 18, 37, 41–42, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 55, 56, 59

Bioethics (Potter) 48

Birth of a Nation, The (Dixon) 21

Black Stork, The (film) 21

Blood of a Nation, The (Jordan) 13

Boas, Franz 16, 27

Bradley, Omar 34

Brain Death Committee 45

Brave New World (Huxley) 36

Buck Carrie 16, 28–30, 33

Buck v. Bell 1–2, 24, 26, 29–30, 31, 32, 51, 54

Burbank, Luther 10

C

Cahn, Edmond 40–41

Callahan, Daniel 49

Carnegie Institute of Washington 10

Childress, Jim 59

Cincinnati Radiation Stu...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Halftitle
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Series Foreword
• Preface
• I: What Lies Ahead
• II: An Exclusionary Movement is Born
• III: Legal Reform to Eliminate Defectives
• IV: Redrawing the Boundaries of Protected Life
• V: Crystallizing Events and Ethical Principles
• Bibliography
• Glossary/Index