Serendipities. Journal for the Sociology and History of the Social Sciences
Book review of: Crothers, Charles. 2018. Sociologies of New Zealand. Sociology Transformed Series... more Book review of: Crothers, Charles. 2018. Sociologies of New Zealand. Sociology Transformed Series. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan. 151 pp.ISBN 978-3-319-73866-6. Price: €53,49
In this paper, we examine the intersections between place and healthcare choice, drawing on Bourd... more In this paper, we examine the intersections between place and healthcare choice, drawing on Bourdieu's concepts of distinction and social space, and engaging with data from interviews with 78 Australians living in varied geographic locations. We find the status of an area is used to judge the quality of its healthcare services. Areas with high status are assumed to have better quality health services than areas of disadvantage. Where people live shapes the choices they make and their judgements about the status of a place. Moreover, having less choice is not necessarily problematic. Participants in regional and remote areas with less choice tend to report positive experiences with healthcare providers. Place can constrain people's ability to make good healthcare choices, yet participants have differing capacities to mobilise resources to overcome the constraints of place.
This article examines a group of intellectual workers who occupy a peripheral but not powerless p... more This article examines a group of intellectual workers who occupy a peripheral but not powerless position in the global economy of knowledge. How do they handle relations with the global metropole, especially in new fields of research where established hierarchies are in question? Three new domains of knowledge – climate change, HIV/AIDS and gender studies – are studied through interviews with 70 active researchers in Southern-tier countries Brazil, South Africa and Australia. A pattern of extraversion, involving active adoption of paradigms from the metropole, is widespread and institutionally supported. Major alternative knowledge formations have not emerged in these domains. However contestations of more specific kinds are frequent. Paradigms are adapted, criticism is offered, activism is engaged, capacities are developed and allegiances sometimes changed. The valorization of local knowledge, which goes beyond the abstractions of universalized paradigms, is particularly significan...
How is global-North predominance in the making of organized knowledge affected by the rise of new... more How is global-North predominance in the making of organized knowledge affected by the rise of new domains of research? This question is examined empirically in three interdisciplinary areas - climate change, HIV-AIDS, and gender studies - through interviews with 70 researchers in Southern-tier countries Brazil, South Africa and Australia. The study found that the centrality of the North was reinstituted as these domains came into existence, through resource inequalities, workforce mechanisms, and intellectual framing. Yet there are tensions in the global economy of knowledge, around workforce formation, hierarchies of disciplines, neoliberal management strategies, and mismatches with social need. Intellectual workers in the Southern tier have built significant research centres, workforces and some distinctive knowledge projects. These create wider possibilities of change in the global structure of organized knowledge production.
The promotion of choice is a common theme in both policy discourses and commercial marketing clai... more The promotion of choice is a common theme in both policy discourses and commercial marketing claims about healthcare. However, within the multiple potential pathways of the healthcare 'maze', how do healthcare 'consumers' or patients understand and experience choice? What is meant by 'choice' in the policy context, and, importantly from a sociological perspective, how are such choices socially produced and structured? In this theoretical article, the authors consider the interplay of Bourdieu's three key, interlinked concepts – capital, habitus and field – in the structuring of healthcare choice. These are offered as an alternative to rational choice theory, where 'choice' is regarded uncritically as a fundamental 'good' and able to provide a solution to the problems of the healthcare system. The authors argue that sociological analyses of healthcare choice
The Palgrave Handbook of Social Theory in Health, Illness and Medicine, 2015
This chapter introduces the sociology of health and medicine as a field of study, its origins and... more This chapter introduces the sociology of health and medicine as a field of study, its origins and contemporary development across the globe. It argues for a role for social theory in the understanding of health and medicine, discussing how social theory performs a variety of purposes and functions, and showcases some of the outstanding achievements in social theory in this field. This leads to a discussion of social theorists and theoretical frameworks, and why some come to prominence and others do not, and why each in turn appears to come ‘into fashion’ and later fall from favour. The chapter concludes with an overview of the structure and contents of the book, explaining the importance of its historical format and broad selection of social theories and theorists.
International Journal of Health Services, Feb 1, 1998
Over the past decade, the Australian hospital sector has undergone a massive economic and adminis... more Over the past decade, the Australian hospital sector has undergone a massive economic and administrative reorganization with ramifications for both the private and the public sectors. Changes such as privatization, deregulation, and the entry of foreign capital into the hospital sector are occurring in the hospital systems of many countries, including Australia, the United States, and the United Kingdom. These developments are radically transforming the hospital sector, altering established relationships between the state, the medical profession, the consumer, and the corporate investor, and raising important questions about the future of hospital services in regard to equity, accessibility, and quality.
The Palgrave Handbook of Social Theory in Health, Illness and Medicine, 2015
Conventional approaches to the sociology of health and medicine sometimes mention the early writi... more Conventional approaches to the sociology of health and medicine sometimes mention the early writings of Frederich Engels on the poor health of the 19th century British working class, but rarely acknowledge the extent to which he, with colleague Karl Marx, lay down an extensive critique of the medical theorising of the period. The first half of the chapter offers an overview of this powerful critique, and outlines a theoretical framework in which the pair revealed the connections between capitalism and poor health. The second half of the chapter indicates how this theoretical framework has been extended in the 20th century by various theorists, including Lesley Doyal and Imogen Pennell, to highlight the intense commodification of health services and the creation of a world-wide healthcare industry.
Abstract: In 1995, with the financial support from the Australian Research Council, a study on Au... more Abstract: In 1995, with the financial support from the Australian Research Council, a study on Australian Privatisation was conducted which included the investigation of circumstances under which privatisation policy has been adopted by successive Australian governments, ...
Http Dx Doi Org 10 5172 Hesr 2013 22 4 338, Dec 17, 2014
The production of sociological knowledge in Australian universities is explored through an empiri... more The production of sociological knowledge in Australian universities is explored through an empirical study of research papers published in a selection of academic outlets between 1960 and 2011. Drawing on theories concerning scholarly practices, institutional formation and the sociology of knowledge, questions are posed about the factors that shape and structure the production of sociological knowledge about health and medicine. The concept of intellectual schools is examined, with evidence sought for the presence of these ‘knowledge networks’ in the Australian context. The study suggests the formation and maintenance of schools are subject to structural factors within the university sector, specifically the relative wealth and prestige of the university and the dictates of the higher education market.
Serendipities. Journal for the Sociology and History of the Social Sciences
Book review of: Crothers, Charles. 2018. Sociologies of New Zealand. Sociology Transformed Series... more Book review of: Crothers, Charles. 2018. Sociologies of New Zealand. Sociology Transformed Series. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan. 151 pp.ISBN 978-3-319-73866-6. Price: €53,49
In this paper, we examine the intersections between place and healthcare choice, drawing on Bourd... more In this paper, we examine the intersections between place and healthcare choice, drawing on Bourdieu's concepts of distinction and social space, and engaging with data from interviews with 78 Australians living in varied geographic locations. We find the status of an area is used to judge the quality of its healthcare services. Areas with high status are assumed to have better quality health services than areas of disadvantage. Where people live shapes the choices they make and their judgements about the status of a place. Moreover, having less choice is not necessarily problematic. Participants in regional and remote areas with less choice tend to report positive experiences with healthcare providers. Place can constrain people's ability to make good healthcare choices, yet participants have differing capacities to mobilise resources to overcome the constraints of place.
This article examines a group of intellectual workers who occupy a peripheral but not powerless p... more This article examines a group of intellectual workers who occupy a peripheral but not powerless position in the global economy of knowledge. How do they handle relations with the global metropole, especially in new fields of research where established hierarchies are in question? Three new domains of knowledge – climate change, HIV/AIDS and gender studies – are studied through interviews with 70 active researchers in Southern-tier countries Brazil, South Africa and Australia. A pattern of extraversion, involving active adoption of paradigms from the metropole, is widespread and institutionally supported. Major alternative knowledge formations have not emerged in these domains. However contestations of more specific kinds are frequent. Paradigms are adapted, criticism is offered, activism is engaged, capacities are developed and allegiances sometimes changed. The valorization of local knowledge, which goes beyond the abstractions of universalized paradigms, is particularly significan...
How is global-North predominance in the making of organized knowledge affected by the rise of new... more How is global-North predominance in the making of organized knowledge affected by the rise of new domains of research? This question is examined empirically in three interdisciplinary areas - climate change, HIV-AIDS, and gender studies - through interviews with 70 researchers in Southern-tier countries Brazil, South Africa and Australia. The study found that the centrality of the North was reinstituted as these domains came into existence, through resource inequalities, workforce mechanisms, and intellectual framing. Yet there are tensions in the global economy of knowledge, around workforce formation, hierarchies of disciplines, neoliberal management strategies, and mismatches with social need. Intellectual workers in the Southern tier have built significant research centres, workforces and some distinctive knowledge projects. These create wider possibilities of change in the global structure of organized knowledge production.
The promotion of choice is a common theme in both policy discourses and commercial marketing clai... more The promotion of choice is a common theme in both policy discourses and commercial marketing claims about healthcare. However, within the multiple potential pathways of the healthcare 'maze', how do healthcare 'consumers' or patients understand and experience choice? What is meant by 'choice' in the policy context, and, importantly from a sociological perspective, how are such choices socially produced and structured? In this theoretical article, the authors consider the interplay of Bourdieu's three key, interlinked concepts – capital, habitus and field – in the structuring of healthcare choice. These are offered as an alternative to rational choice theory, where 'choice' is regarded uncritically as a fundamental 'good' and able to provide a solution to the problems of the healthcare system. The authors argue that sociological analyses of healthcare choice
The Palgrave Handbook of Social Theory in Health, Illness and Medicine, 2015
This chapter introduces the sociology of health and medicine as a field of study, its origins and... more This chapter introduces the sociology of health and medicine as a field of study, its origins and contemporary development across the globe. It argues for a role for social theory in the understanding of health and medicine, discussing how social theory performs a variety of purposes and functions, and showcases some of the outstanding achievements in social theory in this field. This leads to a discussion of social theorists and theoretical frameworks, and why some come to prominence and others do not, and why each in turn appears to come ‘into fashion’ and later fall from favour. The chapter concludes with an overview of the structure and contents of the book, explaining the importance of its historical format and broad selection of social theories and theorists.
International Journal of Health Services, Feb 1, 1998
Over the past decade, the Australian hospital sector has undergone a massive economic and adminis... more Over the past decade, the Australian hospital sector has undergone a massive economic and administrative reorganization with ramifications for both the private and the public sectors. Changes such as privatization, deregulation, and the entry of foreign capital into the hospital sector are occurring in the hospital systems of many countries, including Australia, the United States, and the United Kingdom. These developments are radically transforming the hospital sector, altering established relationships between the state, the medical profession, the consumer, and the corporate investor, and raising important questions about the future of hospital services in regard to equity, accessibility, and quality.
The Palgrave Handbook of Social Theory in Health, Illness and Medicine, 2015
Conventional approaches to the sociology of health and medicine sometimes mention the early writi... more Conventional approaches to the sociology of health and medicine sometimes mention the early writings of Frederich Engels on the poor health of the 19th century British working class, but rarely acknowledge the extent to which he, with colleague Karl Marx, lay down an extensive critique of the medical theorising of the period. The first half of the chapter offers an overview of this powerful critique, and outlines a theoretical framework in which the pair revealed the connections between capitalism and poor health. The second half of the chapter indicates how this theoretical framework has been extended in the 20th century by various theorists, including Lesley Doyal and Imogen Pennell, to highlight the intense commodification of health services and the creation of a world-wide healthcare industry.
Abstract: In 1995, with the financial support from the Australian Research Council, a study on Au... more Abstract: In 1995, with the financial support from the Australian Research Council, a study on Australian Privatisation was conducted which included the investigation of circumstances under which privatisation policy has been adopted by successive Australian governments, ...
Http Dx Doi Org 10 5172 Hesr 2013 22 4 338, Dec 17, 2014
The production of sociological knowledge in Australian universities is explored through an empiri... more The production of sociological knowledge in Australian universities is explored through an empirical study of research papers published in a selection of academic outlets between 1960 and 2011. Drawing on theories concerning scholarly practices, institutional formation and the sociology of knowledge, questions are posed about the factors that shape and structure the production of sociological knowledge about health and medicine. The concept of intellectual schools is examined, with evidence sought for the presence of these ‘knowledge networks’ in the Australian context. The study suggests the formation and maintenance of schools are subject to structural factors within the university sector, specifically the relative wealth and prestige of the university and the dictates of the higher education market.
Uploads
Papers