Individual Rights, Social Justice, and the Allocation of Advances in Biotechnology

Abstract

In this article, the authors apply Alan Gewirth’s Principle of Generic Consistency. They argue that a defensible approach to medical research must give proper place to the problem of allocating any consequent advances in accordance with the moral rights and status of all agents. When this is done, they contend that some advances that cannot be given to everyone ought not to be available to anyone and certain types of applied medical research should not be conducted. This suggests that, when seen in the context of scarcity of resources, situations where the benefits of medical research can legitimately override the rights of research subjects are far more limited than is often recognised.