This title was first published in 2002: This volume discusses the subject of biomedical ethics. Various views, historical and contemporary, are discussed, with the editors using the contrasting concepts in the shift from paternalism to autonomy in 20th-century medicine as a heuristic tool for the critical study of ethics in medicine.As far as the evidence in this volume goes, paternalistic medical practices and patient autonomy had an uneasy relationship by the beginning of the 20th century. A hundred years later, full autonomy in decisions on medical treatment is still subject to numerous caveats. The text pays close attention to the interplay between various players, noting how factors such as social contexts, governmental organizations and the biotechnological industry influence and shape responses to the principle of bioethics.

Andreas-Holger Maehle, Johanna Geyer-Kordesch

1. 'Honour and Interests': Medical Ethics and the British Medical Association 2. The Emergence of Medical Professional Ethics in Germany 3. Health Costs and the Ethics of the German Sickness Insurance System 4. Problems of Consent to Surgical Procedures and Autopsies in Twentieth Century Germany 5. Human Research: From Ethos to Law, from National to International Regulations 6. Ethical Aspects of Life-Saving and Life-Sustaining Technologies 7. Autonomous Agency and Consent in the Treatment of the Terminally Ill 8. The 'Frankensteinian' Nature of Biotechnology