“We Know Best Because Our Skin Is in the Game”: Doing Politics Through DIY Pharmaceuticals

Natasa Stoli, Klasien Horstman and Olga Zvonareva
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Natasa Stoli: Department of Health, Ethics & Society, Maastricht University, The Netherlands
Klasien Horstman: Department of Health, Ethics & Society, Maastricht University, The Netherlands
Olga Zvonareva: Department of Health, Ethics & Society, Maastricht University, The Netherlands

Social Inclusion, 2025, vol. 13

Abstract: In recent years, critical social science scholarship has expanded our understanding of public participation beyond talk‐based and institutionally organised formats, such as citizen juries and focus groups. Building on these insights and relying on digital ethnography, we studied the practices of an online community of transgender activists producing their own hormones to broaden access to hormone replacement therapy (HRT). We argue that they pursue a political cause related to their gender identity, not by partaking in visible protest movements, but by producing what they deem as superior pharmaceuticals. In the process of DIY hormone production, the community members perform three distinct types of political work: contesting the hierarchy of expertise in biomedical science, moving the locus of pharmaceutical production from big pharmaceutical companies to the household, and producing better pharmaceuticals by focusing on affordability and responsiveness. Thus, this article delineates what public participation may look like in hostile circumstances, where it works around public spaces, maintains its invisibility, and is not directed at openly contesting formal institutions.

Keywords: digital ethnography; DIY pharmaceuticals; public participation; science and technology studies; transgender healthcare (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cog:socinc:v13:y:2025:a:9037

DOI: 10.17645/si.9037

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