Technocratic Birth

London | 2019

Will emerging reproductive technologies empower women?

As big companies begin offering egg-freezing benefits to female employees and artificial wombs promise to liberate women from their reproductive duties, countries like the United States are still battling for reproductive freedoms and paid maternity leave.

Technocratic Birth explores how design fiction and realism can promote critical discussions of emerging reproductive technologies. The project introduces XX BIOSYSTEMS, a fictional company offering experimental pregnancy services to those seeking an alternative to in vivo birth. Through documentary film, realistic content, and short stories, Technocratic Birth investigates the motivations, anxieties, and vulnerabilities that may drive us to the complete medicalization of birth. Will technology deliver us from our biological clocks, or does it promise something that technology alone cannot solve?

Ultimately, complex technologies should be developed, designed, and implemented with the input of informed and empowered communities. Technocratic Birth demonstrates how design fiction can be used as a tool to engage the public in conversations that question our relationship with technology and what it means to be human.