Ulf Schmidt - Böcker

At the heart of research with human beings is the moral notion that the experimental subject is altruistic, and is primarily concerned for the welfare of others. Beneath the surface, however, lies a very different ethical picture. Individuals participating in potentially life-saving research sometimes take on considerable risks to their own well-being. Efforts to safeguard human participants in clinical trials have intensified ever since the first version of the World Medical Association's Declaration of Helsinki (1964) and are now codified in many national and international laws and regulations. However, a comprehensive understanding of how this cornerstone document originated, changed, and functions today does not yet exist in the sphere of human research. Ethical Research brings together the work of leading experts from the fields of bioethics, health and medical law, the medical humanities, biomedicine, the medical sciences, philosophy, and history. Together, they focus on the centrality of the Declaration of Helsinki to the protection of human subjects involved in experimentation in an increasingly complex industry and in the government-funded global research environment. The volume's historical and contemporary perspectives on human research address a series of fundamental questions: Is our current human protection regime adequately equipped to deal with new ethical challenges resulting from advances in high-tech biomedical science? How important has the Declaration been in non-Western regions, for example in Eastern Europe, Africa, China, and South America? Why has the bureaucratization of regulation led to calls to pay greater attention to professional responsibility? Ethical Research offers insight into the way in which philosophy, politics, economics, law, science, culture, and society have shaped, and continue to shape, the ideas and practices of human research.

From the early 1990s, allegations that servicemen had been duped into taking part in trials with toxic agents at top-secret Allied research facilities throughout the twentieth century featured with ever greater frequency in the media. In Britain, a whole army of over 21,000 soldiers had participated in secret experiments between 1939 and 1989. Some remembered their stay as harmless, but there were many for whom the experience had been all but pleasant, sometimes harmful, and in isolated cases deadly. Secret Science traces, for the first time, the history of chemical and biological weapons research by the former Allied powers, particularly in Britain, the United States, and Canada. It charts the ethical trajectory and culture of military science, from its initial development in response to Germany's first use of chemical weapons in the First World War to the ongoing attempts by the international community to ban these types of weapons once and for all. It asks whether Allied and especially British warfare trials were ethical, safe, and justified within the prevailing conditions and values of the time. By doing so, it helps to explain the complex dynamics in top-secret Allied research establishments: the desire and ability of the chemical and biological warfare corps, largely comprised of military officials, scientists, and expert civil servants, to construct and identify a never-ending stream of national security threats which served as flexible justification strategies for the allocation of enormous resources to conducting experimental research with some of the most deadly agents known to man. Secret Science offers a nuanced, non-judgemental analysis of the contributions made by servicemen, scientists, and civil servants to military research in Britain and elsewhere, not as passive, helpless victims 'without voices', or as laboratory and desk perpetrators 'without a conscience', but as history's actors and agents of their own destiny. As such it also makes an important contribution to the burgeoning literature on the history and culture of memory.

From the early 1990s, allegations that servicemen had been duped into taking part in trials with toxic agents at top-secret Allied research facilities throughout the twentieth century featured with ever greater frequency in the media. In Britain, a whole army of over 21,000 soldiers had participated in secret experiments between 1939 and 1989. Some remembered their stay as harmless, but there were many for whom the experience had been all but pleasant, sometimes harmful, and in isolated cases deadly.Secret Science traces, for the first time, the history of chemical and biological weapons research by the former Allied powers, particularly in Britain, the United States, and Canada. It charts the ethical trajectory and culture of military science, from its initial development in response to Germany's first use of chemical weapons in the First World War to the ongoing attempts by the international community to ban these types of weapons once and for all. It asks whether Allied and especially British warfare trials were ethical, safe, and justified within the prevailing conditions and values of the time. By doing so, it helps to explain the complex dynamics in top-secret Allied research establishments: the desire and ability of the chemical and biological warfare corps, largely comprised of military officials, scientists, and expert civil servants, to construct and identify a never-ending stream of national security threats which served as flexible justification strategies for the allocation of enormous resources to conducting experimental research with some of the most deadly agents known to man.Secret Science offers a nuanced, non-judgemental analysis of the contributions made by servicemen, scientists, and civil servants to military research in Britain and elsewhere, not as passive, helpless victims 'without voices', or as laboratory and desk perpetrators 'without a conscience', but as history's actors and agents of their own destiny. As such it also makes an important contribution to the burgeoning literature on the history and culture of memory.

This open access volume presents the latest research in propaganda studies, featuring contributions from a range of leading scholars and covering the most cutting-edge scholarship in the study of propaganda from World War I to the present.Propaganda has always played a key role in shaping attitudes during periods of conflict and the academic study of propaganda, commencing in earnest in 1915, has never really left us. We continue to want to understand propaganda’s inner-workings and, in doing so, to control and confine its influence. We remain anxious about pernicious information warfare campaigns, especially those that seemingly endanger liberal democracy or freedom of thought. What are the challenges, then, of studying propaganda studies in the twenty-first century? Much scholarship remains locked into the study of state-led campaigns, however an area of special concern in recent years has been the loss of official control over the basic instruments of mass communication. This has been seen in the rise of ‘fake news’ and the ability of non-state actors to influence political events. The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollection.com. Open access was funded by Knowledge Unlatched.

Studies of post-war Europe have conventionally stressed the Cold War’s ideological divisions and competing economic models. This open access book brings together historians from across Europe to explore the ways in which these political differences were circumvented, subverted, or overcome, whether in the spirit of international collaboration, solidarity or for more pragmatic reasons of national interest.Rethinking Cooperation in Cold War Europe examines the systemic divide not as an Iron Curtain but – borrowing the metaphor of the Hungarian historian György Péteri, as a ‘Nylon Curtain’ – a present and yet surmountable partition that was frequently breached in a variety of ways by ordinary citizens, artists, scientists, politicians, and other historical actors.From environmental collaboration and medical ethics to academic exchanges and peace activism, this book brings to life a complex series of ambiguous allegiances and complicated collaborations. For all of the difficulties, the mistrust, the paranoia, and the ulterior motives, the contributors here demonstrate the myriad ways in which ‘Bloc thinking’ could be and often was overcome in the service of common interests and shared visions. With Europe today facing an array of military and political challenges unprecedented in the post-war era, the book offers a wide-ranging and timely overview of the ways in which channels of communication can be kept open even at times of heightened geopolitical tensions.The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com. Open access was funded by the European Research Council.

This open access book demonstrates that thinking ‘beyond binaries’ in its many forms - capitalist/socialist, men/women, interwar/post-war, east/west, normality/pathology - allows for new insights and understandings of how the intersections between medicine, gender, and sex shaped common ideas, policies, and experiences across post-war Europe. These intersections encompass gendered health discrimination, regional disparities in health outcomes, access to abortion and contraception, eugenics and racism, sex and relationship education, and the medicalisation of LGBTQIA+ identities. Each have continued to significantly influence government policies, medical practices, individual lives, and scientific ideas across Europe. The book therefore engages with important histories related to contemporary debates about reproductive rights, medical ethics, and health legislation. Gender, Sex, and Medicine in Post-War Europe brings together scholars working across disciplines and regions in both East and West Europe to shed light on how gender norms and expressions of sexuality permeated health practices, scientific ideas, medical law, and policymaking across ideological and geographical divides. As such, the volume’s contributions enhance our understanding of both individual and collective medical experiences across post-war Europe and the complex relations between doctors, patients, scientists, and law makers.By examining gender, sex, and medicine in the post-war period, this book fosters new scholarly perspectives on Europe as a continent that, to an extent, overcame the socio-political realities of the Cold War period and shared common ground through parallel experiences, policies, ideals, and beliefs.The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com. Open access was funded by the European Research Council.

This open access volume presents the latest research in propaganda studies, featuring contributions from a range of leading scholars and covering the most cutting-edge scholarship in the study of propaganda from World War I to the present.Propaganda has always played a key role in shaping attitudes during periods of conflict and the academic study of propaganda, commencing in earnest in 1915, has never really left us. We continue to want to understand propaganda’s inner-workings and, in doing so, to control and confine its influence. We remain anxious about pernicious information warfare campaigns, especially those that seemingly endanger liberal democracy or freedom of thought. What are the challenges, then, of studying propaganda studies in the twenty-first century? Much scholarship remains locked into the study of state-led campaigns, however an area of special concern in recent years has been the loss of official control over the basic instruments of mass communication. This has been seen in the rise of ‘fake news’ and the ability of non-state actors to influence political events. The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollection.com. Open access was funded by Knowledge Unlatched.

Born in 1904, Brandt played a major role in the first mass killing programme of the Third Reich, the so called 'euthanasia' programme. As Reich Commissioner for Health and Sanitation, Karl Brandt became the highest medical authority in the Nazi regime; he initiated experiments on concentration camps inmates and was eventually put in charge of biological and chemical warfare. How was it that a rational, highly cultured, literate, young professional could come to be responsible for mass murder and criminal human experiments on a previously unimaginable scale? In this riveting biography, Ulf Schmidt explores in detail that Brandt belonged to a generation of a young 'expert elite', who in the 1930s and 1940s were willing, and empowered, to support and conceive an oppressive, militarist, and racist government policy, and ultimately turn its exterminatory potential into reality. Through a critical biography of Brandt, Schmidt re-evaluates the system of communication at the centre of Hitler's regime. The book extends our understanding of the culture of detachment between a regime that was geared towards total destruction, and a government that was almost totally removed from its people.

This open-access volume consists of papers presented at the conference “Thirty Years of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC): Histories, Achievements, Challenges”, held in Berlin, 5–6 October 2023, as well as of additional contributions.The volume’s twenty-two individual chapters reflect on the history and achievements of the CWC over the past thirty years and explore existing and future challenges as the world realigns itself with a new geopolitical and security environment amid ongoing conflicts in volatile regions such as Eastern Europe and the Middle East.Highlights of the volume include:• Contributions by government officials, renowned scholars, and esteemed members of civil society.• A keynote address by the former Director General of the implementing agency of the CWC, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), providing insights into the treaty’s evolution.• A section examining the potential of the CWC as a model for the abolition of nuclear weapons.