The anthropology of health systems: A history and review

Svea Closser, Emily Mendenhall, Peter Brown, Rachel Neill and Judith Justice

Social Science & Medicine, 2022, vol. 300, issue C

Abstract: Ethnographies of health systems are a theoretically rich and rapidly growing area within medical anthropology. Critical ethnographic work dating back to the 1950s has taken policymakers and health staff as points of entry into the power structures that run through the global health enterprise. In the last decade, there has been a surge of ethnographic work on health systems. We conceptualize the anthropology of health systems as a field; review the history of this body of knowledge; and outline emergent literatures on policymaking, HIV, hospitals, Community Health Workers, health markets, pharmaceuticals, and metrics.

Keywords: Anthropology; Health systems; Health policy & systems research; Ethnography (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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DOI: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2021.114314

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