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This chapter consists of a comparative analysis of emerging debates on synthetic biology in the European Union, China and India. After briefly introducing synthetic biology as a new and emerging science, it maps and compares the emerging debates on synthetic biology in the three regions, focusing on a number of different discourses respectively relating to innovation, risk, and power and control. In addition, the chapter discusses and analyses the role of public and ethics debates as crosscutting and reflective discourses. It considers how these discourses have evolved, what the dominant themes and issues are, which actors are involved and how the discourses have been informed by the value systems and socioeconomic development in the three regions. In conclusion the governance challenges resulting from these discourses are considered.

This chapter provides integrative conclusions and policy recommendations deriving from the analyses of ethics perspectives in the book. It describes the state-of-art in ethics in Europe, India and China in terms of values systems, public debates, advisory bodies and public engagement initiatives. It further provides suggestions for the mainstreaming of socio-ethical analysis in the three regions, paying particular attention to the different innovation needs evident in Europe on one hand and in India and China on the other. Conclusions are drawn for each technology case study (nanotechnology, synthetic biology and new food technologies) while policy recommendations for common research programmes in relation to ethical analysis are provided.