Strange DNA: The rise of DNA Analysis for Family Reunification and its Ethical Implications

DNA analysis for family reunification is a longstanding and widespread practice, but also a highly problematic one, as it is a battleground of conflicting values and interests, which have to be carefully weighed against each other: on the one hand, the right of the sovereign state to regulate immigration and prevent fraud and child trafficking; on the other hand, the right to privacy and family life. Beyond the problem of how to balance these different interests, DNA analysis for family reunification brings up the broader problem of biologisation/geneticisation of social relations, as this practice appears to reduce family to its mere biological notion. As there is no comprehensive account of the ethical implications of DNA analysis in the context of family reunification, the present paper will try to fill this gap by addressing the three most striking ethical problems posed by this issue: the privacy issues at stake; the problems concerning the conceptual, legal and social definition of family; and the question whether this practice intends to produce the immigrant as discriminated “bare life” (Agamben) or must rather be seen as a symptom of an ongoing general biologisation/geneticisation of sociality, also influencing family reunification procedures. Introduction: Tales of hope and despair As early as 1985, when DNA fingerprinting and genetic analysis were still highly contested techniques in forensic practice, Nature carried a report entitled ‘Positive identification of an immigration test-case using human DNA fingerprints’. The authors describe a case in which a Ghanaian boy who was born in the UK but went to Ghana on a visit was denied return to the UK – where his mother and siblings lived – on the grounds of suspected substitution of the boy with a nephew or a totally unrelated child. The family’s lawyer asked for a DNA analysis to establish the parentage of the boy. The test demonstrated that the woman was in fact “the true mother”, so the immigration agency dropped the case and the boy was permitted to return to the UK and to be reunited with his family. But there are Ghanaian DNA analysis tales with less happy endings. In 2007, the New York Times published the story of Issac Owasu, a widower and naturalised US citizen of Ghanaian origin who also resorted to DNA analysis to accelerate his reunion with his four sons still living in Africa. “But modern day science often unearths secrets long buried. When the DNA results landed on Issacs Owusus's dinner table [...], they showed that only one of the four boys [...] was his biological child. [...] The State Department let his oldest son, now 23, come to the United States [...], but said the others – a 19-year-old and 17-year-old-twins – could not come because they are not biologically related to him.” © ESRC Genomics Network. 20 Genomics, Society and Policy