Not merely the absence of disease: A genealogy of the WHO’s positive health definition
| Autor: | Lars Thorup Larsen |
|---|---|
| Rok vydání: | 2021 |
| Předmět: |
History
060106 history of social sciences media_common.quotation_subject Disease World Health Organization World health 03 medical and health sciences 0302 clinical medicine History and Philosophy of Science State (polity) well-being 0601 history and archaeology 030212 general & internal medicine Sociology genealogy Henry E Sigerist Henry E. Sigerist media_common MEDICINE Constitution health CRITIQUE 06 humanities and the arts Genealogy Well-being |
| Zdroj: | Larsen, L T 2022, ' Not merely the absence of disease : A genealogy of the WHO’s positive health definition ', History of the Human Sciences, vol. 35, no. 1, pp. 111-131 . https://doi.org/10.1177/0952695121995355 |
| ISSN: | 1461-720X 0952-6951 |
| DOI: | 10.1177/0952695121995355 |
| Popis: | The 1948 constitution of the World Health Organization (WHO) defines health as ‘a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity’. It was a bold and revolutionary health idea to gain international consensus in a period characterized by fervent anti-communism. This article explores the genealogy of the health definition and demonstrates how it was possible to expand the scope of health, redefine it as ‘well-being’, and overcome ideological resistance to progressive and international health approaches. The first part of the article demonstrates how the health definition was composed through a trajectory of draft ideas from scholars in the history of medicine, as well as political actors working to promote national health insurance. The definition was authored by League of Nations veteran Raymond Gautier, but secretly drew heavily on medical historian Henry E. Sigerist’s controversial book Socialized Medicine in the Soviet Union (1937). The second part analyses how it was possible to resist the ideological pushback against the WHO and secure US ratification. The WHO’s progressive constitution was not simply a deviation from dominant health ideas, but a direct outcome of the entrenched health conflict. The genealogy is based on original archival material from international organizations and US government archives. The article contributes to understandings of the political controversies surrounding the WHO and to scholarship on understandings of health. It also illustrates how influential health ideas cross the boundaries between politics and health sciences, as well as the boundaries between domestic health policy and global health. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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