Abstract
Czech Republic belongs among countries with rigid mandatory vaccination system regulated by the state. To let children vaccinate is considered as an unquestionable norm supported by formal sanctions for those who would not take part in such practice.
This paper focuses on parents who challenge such norm with their decision to refuse their child's immunization. Twenty-two parents whose children were not vaccinated were interviewed and several participant observations were conducted at public lectures concerning immunization and on meetings of parent who actively take part in the debates against compulsory vaccination.
Firstly, the paper examines how the parents' attitudes to health, body and biomedicine become integrated into their attitudes toward vaccination. It uses the concept of biological citizenship to analyze how the attitudes toward biomedicine and vaccination serve as a foundation for the formation of new biosocialities.
It shows how the debates concerning vaccination give rise to subjectivities of parents who claim specific rights based on shared definitions of risk, stances towards biomedicine and notions of individual responsibility towards one's own health. Those parents consciously and systematically construct their own credibility as "informed parents" that is used as key resource while legitimizing their decision.
Secondly, the paper focuses on the conditions of emergence and existence of anti-vaccination movement in the Czech society. It maps how the collective identity of parents becomes articulated through the attitudes toward biomedicine and vaccination.
The paper explores the ways in which parental attitudes towards vaccination facilitates emergence of novel forms of collectivities that allow for generating new and alternative forms of knowledge and resistance against the dominant biomedical knowledge.