[ExI] Small H+ success stories

[Stefano Vaj]

Speaking of the failed referendum for the abrogation of the Italian
prohibitionist law on IFV, cloning and genetic engineering, on Tue,
Mar 4, 2008 at 5:38 PM, Amara Graps <amara at amara.com> wrote on the ExI
chat list:

> From: "Stefano Vaj" <stefano.vaj at gmail.com>
> On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 4:51 PM, Amara Graps <amara at amara.com> wrote:
> >  >  I think it's important for Transhumanists to understand:
> >>   Why too few votes? Why couldn't that referendum gather 50%? Can you
> >>   answer?
> >
> >Mmhhh. Lack of information? Censorship by mainstream media? Cultural
> >limits? Insufficient mobilisation or blatant betrayal of the forces
> >who should theoretically have supported the referendum? Fear of the
> >swinging catholic 4-5% in the upcoming elections ? The
> >clever presentation of the law by its supporters as something
> >concerning only couples with fertility problems (in fact it forbids
> >almost all kinds of human reproductive or genetic technology)?
>
> Thank you for these examples. It's quite a list. These are the
> challenges of yours and AITs and the Italian transhumanists wouldn't you
> say?
> ...
> Your other examples (which depend on education, pure research funding,
> political agendas, the Vatican's influence in Italy's politics) have
> similar (IMO insurmountable) challenges.

Yet, from time to time one finds himself in the position to make a
little difference, and that encourages me to think that one should
"keep up the good fight" and do whatever he can wherever he can,
including in Italy, a country admittedly not devoid of problems.

In fact, as mentioned another time, I was honoured by the appointment
by the Lombardy Parliament, in my capacity of a jurist of some
reputation, as one of the five "wise man" instructed to draft a (kind
of) constitution for Lombardy itself, called Statuto. Since Italy
recently embarked in a slightly more federally-oriented reforn of its
governance, single administrative regions were to implement such
charts reflecting both their enlarged powers and their basic ruling
principles; and Lombardy - which, it is worth remembering, has more
economic weight and population than several entire EU member countries
- was one of the last not having done so yet.

This experience has been of great professional interest, since
practising lawyers draft contracts much more frequently than
constitutions, and scholars usually comment upon them rather than
contributing to their wording. But besides that I obviously took all
the opportunities to pepper generously the proposed constitutional
bill with  H+ memes and spins in at least a dozen of places, even
though, strictly speaking, I should not have any say regarding the
political or philosophical orientation of the constitution, an aspect
that was obviously reserved to elected representatives. :-)

Of course, I never expected much of that to survive to parliamentary
vagaries, not to mention, more importantly, to the reactions of the
much-courted, swinging-vote teocons in both the right-wing majority
and the left-wing opposition (those in the latter call themselves
"teodem", but the difference is often very subtle). Add to that the
deep inroads of explicitely neo-luddite, "deep ecology",
environmentalism in an equally  well-represented and vocal extreme
left, and the least I can I say is that knee-jerk rejections of
anything vaguely sounding H+ were to be taken for granted.

I am however happy to report that more than a few "little things"
managed to survive, namely in the two following important provisions:

"Art. 2 ... In particular, in the framework of its powers, the
Lombardy Region: ...
e) shall promote the preconditions to make effective the freedom of
religion, of thought, of speech, of teaching, of research, as well as
the access to communication media"
(In particolare, nell'ambito delle sue competenze, la Regione:...
e) promuove le condizioni per rendere effettiva la libertà religiosa,
di pensiero, di parola, di insegnamento, di educazione, di ricerca,
nonché l'accesso ai mezzi di comunicazione;)

"Art. 10 - Research and Innovation.
1. The Lombardy Region recognises the leading and central role of the
scientific research and of innovation for the achievement of its goals
in all the fields of economic and social life, and shall strives to
exploit to the maximum possible degree its potential, in cooperation
with universities, research centres, and the techno-scientific and
professional communities.
2. The Lombardy Region shall value, promote and support technological,
scientific and industrial innovations, investments and initiatives in
the field of fundamental and applied research, as well as everything
else that is required to achieve results of excellence in those areas,
including the aspects pertaining to the reaching of decisions and the
related information. ..."
(Ricerca e innovazione
1. La Regione riconosce il ruolo centrale e trainante della ricerca
scientifica e dell'innovazione per il conseguimento dei propri
obiettivi in tutte le sfere della vita economica e sociale e opera per
valorizzarne al massimo grado il potenziale, in collaborazione e
dialogo con le università, i centri di ricerca, le comunità
tecnico-scientifiche e professionali.
2. La Regione valorizza, promuove e incentiva l'innovazione tecnica,
scientifica e produttiva, gli investimenti e le iniziative nel campo
della ricerca di base e applicata, nonché quanto necessario al
raggiungimento di risultati di eccellenza in tali ambiti, ivi compresi
gli aspetti attinenti la formazione delle decisioni e la loro
divulgazione.)

Needless to say, those are mere programmatic points, and as usually
the devil will be in their actual implementation (if any!); but their
enactment in such an explicit form is already far from trivial in the
Italian political, social and cultural context.

And I am proud to say that, at the very least, from now on, whenever
those principles will come into discussion, Italian transhumanists
will be in a position to make reference to an official document of
constitutional relevance in our legal system.

Stefano Vaj