Genetics and the Transformation of the Personal

The shared nature of genetic information presents new challenges for legal understandings of the self. Within traditional legal discourses the individual is conceptualised as separate and autonomous. In contrast, the genetic individual is understood as inherently relational. This paper analyses the transformation of our understandings of the personal. The transformative processes are assessed through discussion of the changing meanings of privacy in the context of genetic information within families; changing views over access to information about biological parentage by children conceived through assisted reproductive technology; preimplantation genetic diagnosis and the changing context of reproductive decisionmaking.