Health and social change : a critical theory / Graham Scambler.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Scambler, Graham.

Series:

Issues in society

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Health--Social aspects.

Health.

Social change.

Social medicine.

Physical Description:

x, 188 pages ; 23 cm.

Place of Publication:

Buckingham ; Philadelphia : Open University, 2002.

Contents:

Part 1 Health, medicine and society 5

1 Paradigms and presuppositions 7

The backdrop of (neo-)positivism 7

Structural-functionalism 12

Interactionism 16

Phenomenology 19

Conflict theory 22

Loose threads 25

2 Postmodern options: pros, cons and rationality 27

The postmodern turn and its conceptual apparatus 27

The postmodern in medical sociology 31

The postmodern: some observations and qualifications 36

Sociology of the postmodern 38

3 Theorizing social change 41

Critical realism, ontology and social structure 42

Critical theory: the decoupling of system and lifeworld 44

Changes in system and lifeworld 48

Part 2 Structural divisions in health and health care 59

4 Health care reform 61

Crisis and reform 63

Models of logics/relations/figurations 65

Health care reform in Britain 66

Clinton and the question of reform in the USA 76

Initial reflections on the 'Third Way' 83

5 The new inequality and health 86

Destandardized work practices 89

Work, 'class' and health inequalities research 91

Wilkinson, Coburn and the health inequalities debate 96

Class relations and the GBH 98

'Categorical', 'derivative' and 'circumstantial' mechanisms 105

A note on the Third Way and health inequalities 107

6 Lifeworld narratives and expert cultures 110

Lifeworld colonization 111

Constructing narratives 113

Illness, the popular sector and gendered caring 116

'Patienthood' in the professional sector 120

Medicine, expert cultures and changing relations 126

The new appeal of healers in the folk sector 131

Part 3 The need for a critical sociology 135

7 From critical theory to critical sociology 137

Civil society and the public sphere 139

Deliberative democracy 141

Social movements, the protest sector of civil society and the public sphere 144

The question of health movements 148

The concept of a critical sociology 151.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages [159]-181) and index.

ISBN:

0335204805

0335204791

OCLC:

47201001