A sociological perspective on public participation in health care

Damien Contandriopoulos

Social Science & Medicine, 2004, vol. 58, issue 2, 321-330

Abstract: This paper presents conclusions drawn from a comparative analysis of three qualitative case studies of participation processes at the regional level in Quebec's healthcare system in Canada. Our objective is twofold: primarily, to draw on our observations to elaborate and discuss a sociological framework for the analysis of public participation; and secondarily, to use our data to criticise many pervasive but questionable preconceptions in the scientific literature on public participation. The framework used applies the social theory of P. Bourdieu in conjunction with the representation framework of H.F. Pitkin to demonstrate how any form of participation will imply some implicit or explicit delegation. The significance of the analysis is its focus on the social operations implied in these acts of delegation and in the use of the concept of symbolic struggles to understand the conflicts arising when the intrinsic legitimacy of the public is appropriated.

Keywords: Public; participation; Sociology; Politics; P.; Bourdieu; Quebec; Healthcare; Case; studies; Canada (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2004
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (18)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277-9536(03)00164-3
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:socmed:v:58:y:2004:i:2:p:321-330

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/supportfaq.cws_home/regional
http://www.elsevier. ... _01_ooc_1&version=01

Access Statistics for this article

Social Science & Medicine is currently edited by Ichiro (I.) Kawachi and S.V. (S.V.) Subramanian

More articles in Social Science & Medicine from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().