The Dystopia of our Times: Genetic Technology and Other Afflictions

Abstract

This essay will concentrate on discussing, in turn, three areas of health - the emergence of new diseases, the harms of persistent organic pollutants, and the threats of biotechnology and genetic engineering - that are linked to ecology and technology. The health crises that will be entailed by the developments I trace in these areas will indelibly mark the first decades of the next century, and are already sounding harsh dystopic warnings around the world. I shall go on to argue that these developments must challenge socialists to find the political means of effecting new forms for international co-ordination and co-operation to recover control over the mobility and concentration of capital and the production technologies it employs; and of directing economic development according to the health criteria of human and environmental well-being at the community and sectoral levels where industrial production takes place.