Commodification of Body Parts in the Global South

Transnational Inequalities and Development Challenges

Firouzeh Nahavandi

• Publisher: Palgrave Pivot
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781137505842
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Comparative Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Thisbook proposes the introduction of a development-related perspective toscholarly critique of the human body's commodification. Nahavandi contends that the commodification of humanbody parts reflects a modern form of such well-known historical phenomena asslavery and colonization, and can be considered a new and additional form ofappropriation and extraction of resources from the Global South. Whatare the commonalities between hairtrade, surrogacy, kidney sale and attraction of brains? The author argues that these allcharacterize a world where increasingly everything can be traded or is consideredto be tradeable. A world where, similar to any other goods, body parts haveentered the global market either legally or illegally. Through a series ofmultidisciplinary comparative studies, the book explores how formscommodification of the human body are fuelled by issues of poverty in theGlobal South, and inequality in transnational relations.

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2016

Firouzeh NahavandiCommodification of Body Parts in the Global South10.1057/978-1-137-50584-2_1

Begin Abstract

1. Introduction

Firouzeh Nahavandi¹

(1)

Université libre de Bruxelles, Bruxelles, Belgium

Abstract

This introduction presents the author’s perspective and outlines the book’s objectives. In a world where nearly everything is traded, body parts, similar to any other goods, have entered the global market in a process now generally referred to as ‘commodification of human body parts’. In that frame, Nahavandi aims to discuss a new type of appropriation of resources from the poor—especially those who also live in poor countries—to accomodate mostly the wealthier citizens and wealthier countries of this world. Thus, the author argues that a development-related perspective should be introduced in response to the commodification of the human body. This perspective has not yet been considered by mainstream theories of development and underdevelopment, nor has it been taken into consideration in mainstream commodification of human body parts approaches.

Keywords

CommodificationKidney transplantHair saleSurrogacyAttraction of brainsGlobalizationPovertyInequalityDemandSupply

End Abstract

We live in a world where more and more goods are traded and considered to be tradable, a world of ‘universal commodification’ (Radin 1996), which construes freedom as the ability to trade everything in free markets. Consequently, in such an environment, everything has a price. Therefore, similar to any other goods, body parts have entered the global market both legally or illegally. They are coveted, advertised, negotiated, sold and bought. Not all transactions have equal consequences; some body parts are even extracted without the consent of the provider, due to existing demand and the black market. Nevertheless, selling one’s body part is never an anodyne act. It usually springs from necessity and despair. It does not equate offering it, which in itself is already not anodyne. Consider the following: you are not satisfied with your looks, especially with your hair. No worries! You can enter a beauty salon, and buy natural hair extensions, which will give you a brand new look. It will cost you a lot, but you will fulfill your dream of beauty. Or say you want a child, but you do not want to or cannot carry it; moreover, you do not want to adopt or maybe you do not fulfill the conditions to be considered for becoming an adoptive parent. Neither is a real problem. If you can afford it and are ready to enter the long procedure that comes with it, you can turn your computer on and consult one of the many websites offering reproductive services in your country. If they are not legal or cost too much locally, someone in a faraway foreign country can help you fulfill your dream of posterity. Finally, perhaps you are unfortunate enough to experience kidney failure and need a transplant, but either don’t fulfill the conditions to get an organ transplant or you do not want to linger on long waiting lists. Again, if you can afford it, you can surely find a doctor and a broker who will do their best to provide you with a kidney so you can reach your dream of health and life. Consider now a completely different case. You are a powerful and rich state. For one reason or another you need specialists, as your own are not enough to respond to your need of hegemony and race for power and ranking. Again because you have resources, you can afford to attract the best and the brightest by giving them multiple opportunities and even a new citizenship. Knowledge and talent, like other goods, have entered the global market and respond to the law of demand and supply. Is this a caricature, or science fiction? Not really.

All these examples and cases illustrate a commodification process, which characterizes today’s world, even though they represent different orders of complexity, competition, and exploitation. Some transactions are legal and some illegal, but they still go on. Some do not have consequences on the health of the providers but may have negative social and psychological consequences, as is the case for hair selling (Chap. 3). Some of these procedures can lead to physical and psychological damages including death of the providers, and require complex medical workups, careful matching, screening, and significant time, as is the case for surrogacy or kidney transplant (Chaps. 4 and 5). And finally, migration of brains might have advantages for the individuals and their families, or even the exporter state however, it also may lead to serious long-term problems for some provider states (symbolic body), beyond identity and belonging problems for the migrant who is scarcely eager to leave everything behind if he is not obliged to do so, and who is after all selling his know-how when other potential migrants will never get the chance to be welcomed abroad. For years, brain drain has been a problem for developing states. The new ‘attraction of brain’ policies of developed states adds more complexity to this already non-resolved issue, as today’s incentives included in migration policies can be interpreted as a way of buying know-how (brain as a body part) (Chap. 6).

As a citizen-consumer, you do not have to know where everything comes from; you just have to be able to write the check. Indeed, the ‘suppliers’ can remain invisible. However, if you dig a little, you will find that an Indian or a Vietnamese woman has given away her hair, or has been robbed of one of her most treasured possessions (Chap. 3). Another woman, somewhere else, is living for a while in a reproductive center, a ‘baby factory’ where she has rented out her womb to gestate your child, and is maybe experiencing emotional damage by not taking home the baby she has carried and delivered (Chap. 4). And finally, someone you have never met, living in a faraway slum is selling his/her kidney to built the house destroyed by a typhoon or to send his/her kids to school (Chap. 5) and is maybe suffering from serious health problems due to the extraction. As a state, you also do not have to really bother about the consequences of the attraction of brain and the looting of the know-how as, for you, the ‘raison d’Etat’ and economic primacy prevail all else (Chap. 6).

The Issue

What are the commonalities between these cases and examples? The pattern is clear: providers are mainly from developing countries and beneficiaries are generally wealthy individuals from developed countries or wealthy countries themselves. Though, in today’s globalized world, the issue is getting more complex. Wealthy consumers from everywhere have integrated the global market. Furthermore, some less wealthy women may go into heavy debt to pay for hair extensions. Some less well-off women/men can also borrow to obtain a baby, while some individuals and families may sell all that they have, borrow from friends and kin, and even indenture themselves to purchase a kidney for themselves or someone dear to them. Hence, together with universal commodification, which “undermines personal identity by conceiving of personal attributes, relationships and philosophical and moral commitments as monetizable and alienable from self” (Radin 1987), a new process of appropriation of resources is progressively becoming ‘normalized’ and is being established as a new, albeit unequal, exchange between the have and have not, and the Global North and the Global South. Although, to some extent, this process also exists within high-income countries or within low-income countries, this book focuses only on the Global North-South relations where the phenomenon is substantially broader and the consequences more severe.

This book is about different levels and instances of what is now generally referred to as ‘commodification of human body parts’ (Chap. 2) and how a new type of appropriation of the resources of low-income countries by high-income countries (hereinafter, the Global South and the Global North) has grown. Features of today’s globalization and the neoliberal economic order, as well as the poverty and inequality that still characterize the international order have permitted and facilitated this appropriation (Chaps. 3–6).¹ Just as in previous centuries, when exploitation through slavery or colonization were barely discussed and were considered ‘normal’, appropriation of the body parts of the poor and marginalized from the Global South, and hence their objectification, appears to have become similarly ‘normalized’. Today, individuals, as did the states in previous centuries, buy and outsource scarce resources (body parts) where the supply is abundant: from the poor in the Global South.

Debates surrounding the commodification of the human body are manifold and increasing. Although such debates are often constructive, most of them have overlooked the contextual dimensions of the process in the Global South, which is characterized by pockets of poverty and inequality, and the transnational inequalities which sustain it. By focusing on the demand and supply of the body parts, this book illustrates the inequality of conditions between the suppliers and buyers. Poverty and inequality perpetuate the commodification process and transform poor people, or countries, into suppliers of body parts for the wealthiest all over the world (Chap. 7). Therefore, not taking into consideration the context may hinder the implementation of adequate measures addressing the issue. Thus, this book also argues for a development-related perspective to be introduced into responses to the commodification of the human body. As long as people are ready and sometimes eager to sell their body parts because of their situation, the issue of commodification of human body parts cannot be completely tackled. This means that more attention should be given to the suppliers and their situation. Framing the transactions or regulating them will never suffice to stop people from readily endangering themselves in order to address their basic needs and aspirations or those of their family, and therefore be willing to subject themselves to exploitation. The commodification issue is a global one, which requires drawing attention to the ongoing poverty and inequality of the world.

This book integrates thirty years of experience from my work in development research and teachings along with my fieldwork, mainly in Asia and Africa that have provided me with a look at the evolution of the development process. I have observed and studied the results of successive development plans and economic models and assessed the damages of poverty and the results of the neoliberal stance and economic globalization, which started in the 1970s. I have considered, with interest, all the new steps and roadmaps in the framing of development policies, especially those intended to overcome poverty, such as the Millennium Development Goals, nowadays replaced with a new commitment that aims to eliminate extreme poverty by 2030. One of the main characteristics of the post-2015 agenda is to focus on what matters most to the poor. Nevertheless, these plans do not really include an explicit goal of reducing income inequalities. Poverty is a phenomenon as old as human history. Although its significance may have changed over time (Rahnema 2003) it is still a global problem. Hunger is one of its dimensions. According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, about 805 million people of the 7.3 billion people in the world, or around one in nine, were suffering from chronic undernourishment in 2012-14, regularly not getting enough food to conduct an active life. The majority, 791 million, lived in developing countries, representing 13.5 percent, or one in eight, the population of those countries (FAO, IFAD and WFP 2014).

In turn, inequality has also existed since the beginning of human history. The Greek philosopher Plutarch noted in his time: “Disequilibrium between rich and poor is the most ancient and fatal sickness of Republics” (Galbraith 2011, p. 22). Inequality continues to be a global problem and a barrier to poverty reduction. The last Oxfam Reports state that almost half of the world’s wealth is owned by just 1 percent of the population, and seven out of ten people live in countries where economic inequality has increased in the last 30 years. Extreme economic inequality is damaging and worrisome for many reasons: it is morally questionable; it can have a negative impact on economic growth and poverty reduction; and it can multiply social problems. Furthermore, it compounds other inequalities, such as those between women and men (Fuentes-Nieva and Galasso 2014; Hardoon 2015). Poverty and uneven distribution of wealth, resources and power are closely related, and encourage another age-old problem: the exploitation of human beings. In this book, my objective, by addressing commodification of the human body, is to focus on an additional dimension of inequality in transnational relations, which is derived from the growth of new phenomena induced by remaining poverty and inequality along with the progress of science, increased connectedness of the world, and market-oriented economic model. Amidst the neoliberal readjustments of the new global economy, there has been a rapid growth of procedures that include developing countries and some of their citizens in new transnational transactions. New recipes marred with inequities make participate, by selling their body parts, the poorest and marginalized individuals of the world in todays’ market-oriented society; and global race for talent leads well-educated citizens of developing world to sell their know-how (brain) and respond to the best offer. As already mentioned the underlying pattern is the same: resources from the Global South’s bodies are extracted mostly in benefit of the Global North and their citizens. Thus, with this book I intend to draw attention on a dimension which has not been considered per se by the commodification of body parts approaches, and not tackled by mainstream development and underdevelopment theories, thus adding another example to the unequal exchange’s discussion.

Even though some phenomena addressed in the following chapters have existed in one form or anoth...