The Dynamics of the Reproductive Economy: Forms of Appropriation in Global Fertility Chains

Since the 2000s, the use of commercial reproductive technologies has expanded globally. Currently, scholars speak of a third phase of the reproductive economy, characterized by a globalized intertwining of reproductive medical services, the emergence of new private entrepreneurial business models, and processes of financialization. Against this background, there are accelerated and complex dynamics of proprietary appropriation of bodily substances and generativity in reproductive medicine: practices such as in vitro fertilization, sperm, egg, and embryo transfer, and surrogacy are becoming increasingly widespread. In these procedures, reproductive bodily material from third parties-typically for payment-is used by individuals or couples with unfulfilled desires for children. An entire service industry has grown up around these services - counseling agencies, clinics, referral agencies, gamete banks, insurance companies, etc. - working together and in interconnected chains, often on a global scale.

This philosophical-sociological research project examines how forms of appropriation of human generativity intersect in the context of globalization and financialization of the reproductive economy. The project builds on recent research on "global fertility chains" and seeks to develop these findings empirically and theoretically from a property-theoretical perspective. On the one hand, we investigate privately organized forms of access to reproductive bodily substances and capacities. At the same time, we draw on the concept of "propertization" that was central to the initial phase of the project and aim to refine it through a theoretical-conceptual exploration of appropriation.

The sociological aspect of the project examines reproductive medical services that global corporations (such as Google, Deutsche Bank, etc.) have offered their employees in recent years. In particular, this includes "social egg freezing," where young women freeze their eggs for possible future fertility treatments. We hypothesize that employee reproductive health benefits facilitate the flexible management of (primarily female) generativity across life stages according to productivity demands. At the same time, these benefits support the expansion and networking of reproductive medical services and firms, contributing to the globalization of the reproductive economy. This connection will be explored comparatively through qualitative empirical case studies and theoretical-conceptual analysis.

The philosophical component focuses on the historical and conceptual philosophical analysis of the term "appropriation" in order to make it systematically useful for reconstructing processes of propertization in the third phase of reproductive economies. Heuristically, five forms of appropriation - labor, technical, legal, epistemic, and affective - are distinguished and explored in the context of global fertility chains. Drawing on current social philosophical debates on expropriation and exploitation as well as relevant social science studies on the reproductive economy, this project seeks to clarify the social theoretical potential of the concept of appropriation. In sum, this project aims to make a significant contribution to the understanding of the structural transformation of property, especially with regard to the shifting boundaries between different property arenas.