Book ID: CBB723324691

The Colonial Politics of Global Health: France and the United Nations in Postwar Africa (2018)

unapi

Pearson, Jessica Lynne (Author)


Harvard University Press


Publication Date: 2018
Physical Details: 272
Language: English

In The Colonial Politics of Global Health, Jessica Lynne Pearson explores the collision between imperial and international visions of health and development in French Africa as decolonization movements gained strength. After World War II, French officials viewed health improvements as a way to forge a more equitable union between France and its overseas territories. Through new hospitals, better medicines, and improved public health, French subjects could reimagine themselves as French citizens. The politics of health also proved vital to the United Nations, however, and conflicts arose when French officials perceived international development programs sponsored by the UN as a threat to their colonial authority. French diplomats also feared that anticolonial delegations to the United Nations would use shortcomings in health, education, and social development to expose the broader structures of colonial inequality. In the face of mounting criticism, they did what they could to keep UN agencies and international health personnel out of Africa, limiting the access Africans had to global health programs. French personnel marginalized their African colleagues as they mapped out the continent’s sanitary future and negotiated the new rights and responsibilities of French citizenship. The health disparities that resulted offered compelling evidence that the imperial system of governance should come to an end. Pearson’s work links health and medicine to postwar debates over sovereignty, empire, and human rights in the developing world. The consequences of putting politics above public health continue to play out in constraints placed on international health organizations half a century later.

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Reviewed By

Review Phillip C. Naylor (2020) Review of "The Colonial Politics of Global Health: France and the United Nations in Postwar Africa". American Historical Review (pp. 345-346). unapi

Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB723324691/

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Authors & Contributors
Gaudillière, Jean-Paul
Beaudevin, Claire
Whiteside, Alan
Campani, Carlos Eduardo D’Avila Pereira
Peter Piot
Maes, Kenneth
Concepts
Public health
Global health
France, colonies
Epidemics
Health care
Medicine and society
Time Periods
20th century, late
21st century
20th century
20th century, early
19th century
Places
Africa
France
Ethiopia
Timor Island
Myanmar (Burma)
Ghana
Institutions
World Health Organization (WHO)
United Nations
World Bank
UNICEF
Harvard School of Public Health
Centers for Disease Control (U.S.)
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