“Serve others, not serve oneself” When bioanthropology does not exploit and promote autonomy

Abstract

Bioanthropology is a scientific field which knowledge is based on the study of living and deceased humans. It produces a discourse on reality conditioned by the social and cultural circumstances from which it is produced. Its origin and context of development has been the legitimation of politics of domination through looting, killing and moral judgement of targeted human populations. In order to disjoint from this legacy and to respond to the obligation of social benefit implied by any scientific field financed by the people through taxes, it is paramount to consider ways in which bioanthropology could contribute to the self-determination of all humans and not to increase social asymmetries. To recognize the contribution of the people who participate in scientific investigations –only those which do not imply risks of physical or moral harm– through remuneration can constitute a step forward, although minimal. This paper offers arguments to provide remuneration an ethical structure without underestimating its limitations. Those arguments are inscribed into a larger movement that aims to redefine the scientific commitment –a movement which Participatory Action Research takes a large part in Latin America since the seventies. Such commitment tends to redistribute social and material benefits of scientific investigation through the production of a dialogue between researchers and researchees.