Organlegging

Organlegging is the name of a fictional crime in the Known Space universe created by Larry Niven. It is the illicit trade of black market human organs for transplant. The term organlegging is a portmanteau combining the words "organ" and "bootlegging", literally the piracy and smuggling of organs.

The crime developed as a response to the Organ Bank Problem, a concept featured prominently in the early Known Space stories, particularly those set in the 21st and 22nd century. The Organ Bank Problem is a central theme in the novel A Gift from Earth, as well as the Gil Hamilton detective stories. As speculative fiction, the concept is a prime example of a Gedankenexperiment. It is an examination of the consequences to society of a new technology (in this case, the perfection of organ transplants) and an existing problem (organ shortage), carried to a logical conclusion.

The effect of technology on society is a recurring theme in Niven's stories.

In Niven's universe, the technology to indefinitely sustain any human organ outside of the body was developed in the early 21st century, greatly simplifying organ transplants. This led to the creation of "organ banks" which, in theory, one could use to extend life indefinitely so long as a compatible organ had been donated at any point, as opposed to a complicated waiting list in combination with limited time to transport the organ to the recipient. In light of this, all forms of burial save complete harvesting of organs for transplant became illegal. This resulted in an increased quality of life, but quickly became its own problem; the banks required donors (i.e. dead people) to operate, but when the death rate is reduced (via the organ banks), the number of donors decreases. Thus, the supply of organs would continually reduce.

Compounding this problem, the high success rate of organ transplants tended to discourage research into other viable medical treatments. As a result, medical research was stagnated to a large extent, focusing primarily on improving transplants and little else. Repairing a failing organ (which could presumably fail again later) was considered secondary to the "complete" solution of replacing the failing organ.

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