Synopses & Reviews
Social Movements and the Transformation of American Health Care is the first collection of essays to examine dynamics of change in health care institutions through the lens of contemporary theory and research on collective action. Bringing together scholars from medicine, health management and policy, history, sociology, and political science, the book conceptualizes the American health care system as being organized around multiple institutions-including the state, biomedical fields, professions, and health delivery organizations. By shifting attention toward the organizing structures and political logics of these institutions, the essays in this book illuminate the diversity in both sites of health-related collective action and the actors seeking transformations in health institutions.
The book considers health-related social movements at four distinct levels of analysis. At the most macro level, essays analyze social movements that seek changes from the state in the regulation, financing, and distribution of health resources, including private and public insurance coverage, service delivery, and clinical research. A second set of essays considers field-level analyses of institutional changes in such wide-ranging areas as public health, bio-ethics, long-term care, abortion, and AIDS services. A third set of essays examines the relationship between social movements and professions, examining the "boundary crossing" that occurs when professionals participate in social movements or seek changes in existing professions and the health practices they endorse. A final set of essays analyzes the cultural dominance of the medical model for addressing health problems in the United States and its implications for collective attempts to establish the legitimacy of particular issues, framings, and political actors in health care reform.
Review
"A volume that fills a major gap--a theoretically rich, very well integrated, and quite timely collection by a distinguished group of scholars that illuminates the role of social movements and collective action in the transformation of the U.S. health care system."--John D. McCarthy, Professor of Sociology, The Pennsylvania State University
"Social Movements and the Transformation of American Health Care succeeds wonderfully in the editors' objective to bridge the divide between scholarship in the field of social movements and that of health care. As issues relating to health become ever more central in American politics and culture, the essays in this volume offer unusually valuable insights into this crucial and contested terrain."--Carole Joffe, author of Dispatches from the Abortion Wars
"This is a compelling and innovative collection that opens an analytically fruitful and politcally important door for sociological research." --Contemporary Sociology
Synopsis
Few contemporary social problems in the U.S. affect more people daily than those within the American health care system. Social Movements and the Transformation of American Health Care is the first collection of essays to examine dynamics of change in health care institutions through the lens of contemporary theory and research on collective action. Gathering scholars from medicine, health policy, history, sociology, and political science, the book considers health-related social movements from four distinct levels, concentrating on movements seeking changes in the regulation, financing, and distribution of health resources; changes in institutions in public health, bio-ethics, and other fields; interactions between social movements and professions; and the cultural dominance of the medical model, and the difficulties for framing and legitimizing new issues in health care it poses. At a time when American health care is long overdue for major changes, this book takes an essential look at movements, policies, and institutions to identify the common constraints and opportunities for reform within the health care system.
About the Author
Jane Banaszak-Holl is Associate Professor of Health Management and Policy in the School of Public Health, a Research Associate Professor in the Institute of Gerontology at the School of Medicinem and Adjunct Associate Professor of Organizational Studies in the College of Literature, Science and Arts, at the University of Michigan.
Sandra R. Levitsky is Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Michigan.
Mayer Zald is Professor Emeritus of Sociology, Social Work, and Management at the University of Michigan. He has authored or edited twenty-one books, and more than seventy articles. Among other honors, he is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Table of Contents
Preface
1. Social Movements and the Transformation of U.S. Health Care: Introduction, Sandra R. Levitsky and Jane Banaszak-Holl
Section One: Transformation of State Financing and Regulation
2. The Limitations of Social Movements as Catalysts for Change, Constance A. Nathanson
3. The Challenge of Universal Health Care: Social Movements, Presidential, Leadership, and Private Power, Beatrix Hoffman
4. The Consumer-Directed Health Care Movement: Defining the Limits of Democratic Representation, Jill Quadagno and J. Brandon McKelvey
5. Mobilizing for Reform: Cohesion in State Healthcare Coalitions, Holly Jarman and Scott L. Greer
6. The Strength of Diverse Ties: Multiple Hybridity in the Politics of Inclusion and Difference in U.S. Biomedical Research, Steven Epstein
Section Two: The Reorientation of Institutional Fields
7. Field Analysis and Policy Ethnography in the Study of Health Social Movements, Phil Brown, Rachel Morello-Frosch, Stephen Zavestoski, Laura Senier, Rebecca Gasior Altman, Elizabeth Hoover, Sabrina McCormick, Brian Mayer, and Crystal Adams
8. The Institutionalization of Community Action in Public Health, Mark Wolfson and Maria Parries
9. Social Movement Challenges to Structural Archetypes: Abortion Rights, AIDS, and Long-Term Care, Martin Kitchener
10. The "Hostile Takeover" of Bioethics by the Religious Right and the Counter-Offensive, Renee R. Anspach
Section Three: Professions and Organizations in the Transformation of Health Care and Research
11. Shadow Mobilization for Environmental Health and Justice, Scott Frickel
12. Bringing Social Movement Theory to Health Care Practice in the English National Health Service, Paul Bate and Glenn Robert
13. Complementary and Integrative Medicine in Medical Education: The Birth of an Organized Movement, Michael S. Goldstein
14. Sources of Self-Help Movement Legitimation, Matthew E. Archibald
Section Four: Culture and Legitimacy in US Health Care
15. Hot or Not?: Obstacles to Emerging Climate-Induced Illness Movements, Sabrina McCormick
16. From Infanticide to Activism: Emotions and Identity in Self Help Movements, Verta Taylor and Lisa Leitz
17. Framing Hazards in the Health Arena: Mis-framings, Frame Disputes and Frame Shifting in Relation to Obesity, Work-Related Diseases, and Gamete Transfer in Infertility, David A. Snow and Roberta G. Lessor
18. Conclusion: The Shape of Collective Action in the U.S. Health Sector, Verta Taylor and Mayer N. Zald