(Not) Making “Hexternologous”. Fertilization The Italian ART Law and its paradoxes

Abstract

The Italian law regulating ART approved in 2004 is at the centre of this conversation, which departs from the book ‘Fecondazione e(s)terologa’ (2012) written by two prominent Italian professionals in the field. The three contributors of this conversation analyse different profiles of the law: the contradictions between Catholic moral order and a scientific rationality which is not fully aware of its heteronormativity (Parolin); the macropolitics of information along Italian history and the moral economy surrounding fertilization techniques (Metzler); Law 40 in the context of the EU landscape of reproductive rights (Schuster). All the three voices of the conversation emphasize the paradoxes of ART in Italy and the perverse effects of the prohibition of heterologous fertilization, namely the medical exodus of Italian couples outside of the Italian territory.

Keywords

• heterologous fertilization
• law 40
• moral order
• scientific rationality
• reproductive rights