“Social Equality in an Alternate World”

Since the conception of genetics research on human behavior, the field has engendered controversy and debate. The history behind social and behavioral genomics, or sociogenomics, is marred by forced involuntary sterilizations (see the 1927 Supreme Court case Buck v. Bell), laws outlawing interracial marriage, and (successful) efforts to restrict immigration. Indeed, many of the behaviors and outcomes that occupy sociogenomic research today were first defined and studied by eugenicists seeking to validate social hierarchies and inequalities. Given this history, it is unsurprising that behavior geneticist Kathryn Paige Harden’s new book, The Genetic Lottery: Why DNA Matters for Social Equality, is causing a stir. Social and behavioral genetics research has largely been used to justify social inequalities; could it, as Harden suggests, be used to create a society that is fairer and more just?

Central to the book is Harden’s argument that there are two lotteries. The first is who your parents are and the environment you live in (the social lottery). The second is what your parents pass on to you genetically (the genetic lottery). Harden writes, “Those of us who have not experienced the challenges of psychosis or addiction or deep poverty are lucky. Some of that luck is circumstantial; some of that luck is embodied” (p. 213). Harden reiterates throughout the book that nature and nurture come together to shape a person’s health, how far they go in school, and their income. However, despite the growing literature on how genetic differences shape differences in individuals’ social outcomes, those who consider themselves politically progressive have chosen, Harden argues, to ignore the role of nature due to a fear of how this acknowledgment might be weaponized by their political foes. This willful ignorance, in turn, perpetuates the myth of meritocracy: “Building a more compassionate society means reminding ourselves of luck, and of the gratitude and obligations it entails, against inevitable resistance” (p. 249). For society to support the flourishing of all human beings, Harden says, it must recognize that genes contribute to differences between individuals and seek to understand how and why in order to respond.

I agree with Harden that building a more compassionate society requires a commitment to addressing social inequality. However, I believe that Harden and I have different conceptualizations of social equality and that we disagree about whether social and behavioral genomics research can lead to it. Central to our disagreement is the fact that research on the genetics of human behavior does not enhance understanding about why people from radically different environments experience different social outcomes. Therefore, such research does little to build society’s understanding of social inequalities between individuals whose environmental contexts are radically different. Yet developing this understanding is, I believe, crucial to fostering social equality. We all live in a world rife with racial discrimination, rampant ableism, and policies that entrench socioeconomic stratification, allow the rich to get richer, and tend to make the poor poorer. Genomics research does not offer a way to understand or address these kinds of structural forces—forces that are central to social equality and inequality. Given this, I am unconvinced that embracing a political agenda in which genetics matter for social equality, as Harden advocates, will in practice advance efforts to reduce social inequality.

I view society’s distribution of well-being as a measure of social equality. This distribution is nonrandom. More specifically, structural inequalities are nonrandom; they are driven by purposive policies and social institutions. Whether someone is born into a family living in poverty may be a matter of “luck,” or random fortune, that is no fault of their own. It is not, however, a matter of luck that poverty exists in the first place. Poverty is maintained by intentional policy decisions and structural forces, just as racism is maintained by changes to voter laws that dispossess voters of color and ableism is maintained by disinvestment in infrastructures (such as public transportation) that are rendered inaccessible to those who are less physically mobile. As Ruha Benjamin argues in Race after Technology: Abolitionist Tools for the New Jim Code (2019), all of us should be asking ourselves who gets to define, distribute, hoard, and obtain “fortune” in our society. Without an awareness of the social context, the eugenic narratives Harden is trying to reclaim genetic science from will continue to circulate, despite her and others’ best intentions.

But what if we considered an alternative possible world (to echo the title of chapter 8 in The Genetic Lottery)? In this world, there are no structural inequalities. Social policies are applied and received equally, and racism, classism, and ableism are relics of the past. In this alternate world, I can accept Harden’s argument that social inequality will still exist and continue unless we acknowledge the existence of the genetic lottery and respond to it with redistributive policies. But this is not the world we live in. Moreover, we do not, as Harden admits, “live in a world where there is unlimited time and research funding and trained scientific talent and political will to intervene” (p. 235). Given these constraints, is securing social equality best achieved by trying to understand and address inequalities that may arise between siblings who grow up in the same environment but end up in different places in life partially because of their genes? Or is a better use of our time and resources seeking to understand and address structural inequality? The magnitude with which structural inequality contributes to social inequalities is greater than the role of the genetic lottery. This means that the urgency with which to tackle these different forms of inequality necessarily differs as well.

My disagreements with Harden not-withstanding, she is a beautiful writer, weaving together personal narrative and complex technical concepts skillfully. Her writing is accessible to nonexperts, and the argument she makes—that it is both valuable and politically progressive for researchers of social outcomes to study DNA—is provocative. With this argument, The Genetic Lottery invites a necessary debate. Harden painstakingly explains the technical differences between genetic ancestry and race, shares her views on how genetics could be used to understand the environment, and calls on those who care about helping the socially vulnerable to recognize the role of biology. At the same time, Harden acknowledges her field’s flaws. It is dominated by researchers who, like her, identify as White, and it disproportionately studies individuals classified as having European genetic ancestry. These are thorns in the side of social and behavioral genomics. Not only does the homogeneity of the field’s researchers constrict the breadth of potential research questions and considerations, but, in addition, any potential benefits are confined to a narrow subset of the global population. If geneticists writ large want their work to be equitable, they will have to overcome the challenge of figuring out not only how to collect more diverse samples but also how to be inclusive throughout the research enterprise.

Genetics research is not without benefit, promise, or excitement. Harden certainly sees her field as one that has a lot to offer: more robust social sciences research and rigorous policy evaluation, the grounds for greater empathy among people who differ from one another. I remain skeptical, however, that social and behavioral genomics can address social inequality. We humans simply do not live in the alternate world that Harden and I wish we did.