Barbara Prainsack

Barbara Prainsack is a Professor at the Department of Political Science, University of Vienna, Austria, and the Department of Global Health & Social Medicine at King’s College London, UK. She directs the Centre for the Study of Contemporary Solidarity (CeSCoS) in Vienna. Her research focuses on the social, regulatory, and ethical dimensions of biomedicine and bioscience, including personalized medicine, citizen participation in science, and solidarity in healthcare.

Affiliations and Roles:

• Member, Austrian National Bioethics Commission (2009–)
• Member, European Group on Ethics in Science and New Technologies (2017–)
• Chair, European Science Foundation’s Forward Look on Personalised Medicine (2011–2012)
• Affiliate, Centre de recherche en éthique (CRE), University of Montreal & HeLEX, University of Oxford

Research Interests: Prainsack’s work bridges political science, sociology, and bioethics. Key areas include data governance, regulation of DNA technologies, and the ethical implications of precision medicine. She investigates how societal values shape biomedical innovation and policy, emphasizing participatory approaches to science and healthcare governance.

Awards and Recognition:

• Elected Foreign Member, Danish Royal Academy of Sciences and Letters (2017)
• Bellagio Fellow, Rockefeller Foundation (2016)
• Best article in Austrian Journal of Political Science (2012)

Professional History: Prior roles include Professor of Sociology at King’s College London (2014–), Reader in Sociology (2013–2014), and academic positions at Brunel University and Goethe University Frankfurt. She completed postdoctoral research at the University of Vienna and was a visiting doctoral student at UC San Francisco (2002).