Cybernetic organisms and cybernetic organizations. A study based on the Colombian health security system

Abstract

Based on an ethnographic study conducted in the year 2000 at a private clinic of Bucaramanga (Colombia), is here presented an analysis of the tecno-social relationships that are established in the colombian Health Security System. The main interest of the present paper is to examine the creation of cyborgs in two different ways: 1. As cybernetic organisms, product of surgical interventions that interweave bodies and machines, aiming to eliminate illness and/or to maintain health; 2. As cybernetic organizations, structured as corporations, where the games of power and the practices of freedom are viewed as self-regulatory due to various governemental techniques. A cyborg is therefore here presented as an hybrid not only for its’ internal structure but also due to the interrelations that are established by a heterogenous semantic network, the dynamics of which form part of it.