Bringing relational comparison into development studies: Global health volunteers’ experiences of Sierra Leone

Andrew Brooks and Clare Herrick
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Andrew Brooks: Department of Geography, King’s College London, Bush House, Strand, London, UK
Clare Herrick: Department of Geography, King’s College London, Bush House, Strand, London, UK

Progress in Development Studies, 2019, vol. 19, issue 2, 97-111

Abstract: Global health volunteering is premised on a comparative understanding of development: hospitals in developing countries are ‘behind’ modern institutions in developed nations, and sharing volunteers’ skills will enable the latter to ‘catch-up’. We argue for a ‘relational comparison’ in development studies, which draws upon a geographical conception of inequality premised on understanding places in relation to one another rather than reifying differences between countries. We place a particular hospital within a dialectical totality of combined and uneven development. Health workers’ experiences of volunteering in Sierra Leone demonstrate that local problems, including staff shortages and corruption, are enveloped within global processes.

Keywords: Geography; global health; relational comparison; Sierra Leone; uneven development; volunteering (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:prodev:v:19:y:2019:i:2:p:97-111

DOI: 10.1177/1464993418822857

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