Biokapitalismus und Inwertsetzung der Körper

Perspektiven der Kritik

Abstract

The article discusses the ways in which bio-capitalism has been analyzed and criticized during the last decade. In contrast to analyses that reduce bio-capitalism to the emergence of bio-tech-industries and the respective transformations of capitalist accumulation, the author argues for an understanding of bio-capitalism as specific mode of bio-politics that does not only involve new strategies of accumulation but also transformations of subjectivities and modes of livings. In particular, the article explores three critical perspectives – bioethics, the critique of marketization, and attempts to rethink political economy – and asks how they contribute to a critical understanding of bio-capitalist modes of the production, circulation and consumption of body materials.