Biosecurity in the Global Age: Biological Weapons, Public Health, and the Rule of Law (Stanford Law Books)

Biosecurity comprehensively analyzes the dramatic transformations that are reshaping how the international community addresses biological weapons and infectious diseases. The book examines the renewed threat from biological weapons, and explores the new world of biological weapons governance. Gostin and Fidler argue that the arms control approach in the Biological Weapons Convention no longer dominates. Other strategies have emerged to challenge the arms control approach, and the book identifies four important policy trends—the criminalization of biological weapons, regulation of the biological sciences, management of the biodefense imperative, and preparation for biological weapons attack. The book also explores the challenges to public health resulting from new security threats. The authors look at the linkages between security and public health policy, both at the national and international level. For instance, Gostin and Fidler scrutinize the difficulty of developing policies that improve defenses against both biological weapons and the threat of infectious diseases from new viral strains. The new worlds of biological weapons and public health governance raise the importance of crafting policy responses informed by the rule of law. Thinking about the rule of law underscores the importance of finding globalized forms of biosecurity governance. The book explores patterns in recent governance initiatives and advocates building a "global biosecurity concert" as a way to address the threats biological weapons and infectious diseases present in the early 21st century. "Biosecurity in the GlobalAge offers a comprehensive analysis of the dramatic transformations reshaping how the international community addresses biological weapons and infectious diseases. Fidler and Gostin argue that the arms control approach first outlined in the Biological Weapons Convention no longer dominates, and they identify four emerging policy trends - the criminalization of biological weapons, the regulation of the biological sciences, the management of the biodefense imperative, and the preparation for biological weapons attack. The authors look at the links between security and public health policy, both at the national and international level, and scrutinize the difficulty of developing policies that improve defenses against both biological weapons and the threat of infectious diseases from new viral strains." "The renewed threat of biological weapons highlights the importance of crafting policy responses informed by the rule of law. This book explores patterns in recent governance initiatives and advocates building a "global biosecurity concert" as a way to address the threats presented by biological weapons and infectious diseases in the early 21st century."--Jacket Biosecurity in the Global Age comprehensively analyzes the security threats that biological weapons and naturally occurring infectious diseases pose to societies in the early 21st century. The book explains how these weapons and infectious diseases create security challenges, analyzes each of these threats in detail, and explores the new governance strategies emerging to address these rapidly changing problems.