The Concept and Project of European Bioethics

All until recently, the term "European bioethics" was quite rarely used and shaded by the phenomenon of general "Americanisation". Even today after the discovery of the work of Fritz Jahr (1895-1953) and after placing the first concept of bioethics (both terminologically and substantially) to Germany of the 1920s, "European bioethics" is not easy to define theoretically, nor is it easy to advocate the uniqueness of its identity. The rootedness of "European bioethics" (and the necessity of this rootedness) in a specific geographical-historical context, and its foundation upon the heritage of European classic and modern thinkers (Aristotle, Kant, Schwitzer, Jahr, Jonas, etc.) may most certainly be considered to be a key determinant. However, the relationship between "European" on the one hand and "Asian" ("Far-Eastern"), "Latin-American" and perhaps other "bioethics" on the other remains to be defined. Settings out from these presuppositions, a far-reaching project has recently been launched in Croatia on the research and affirmation of the roots and of the integrative pluriperspectival methodology of "European bioethics" as a category that opposes the widely spread practice of reducing modern bioethics to medical ethics and principalism. This project includes the first international symposium on the work of Fritz Jahr, his models and reaches, which was held in Rijeka and Opatija (Croatia) on 11-12 March 2011, the formation of an international scholars`network (EuroBioNethics), the formulation of The Rijeka Declaration on the Future of Bioethics, and the establishment of the "Fritz Jahr Award" for the research and promotion of European Roots of Bioethics.