QUICK SEARCH:   [advanced] Author: Keyword(s): Year:  Vol:  Page:
Home | Help | Feedback | Subscriptions | Archive | Search | Table of Contents

This Article Full Text (PDF) References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Citation Map Services Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Frankford, D. M. Search for Related Content PubMed PubMed Citation Social Bookmarking                   What's this?

The Normative Constitution of Professional Power

This article concerns the manner in which we think and talk about power in health care policy and regulation, and the political and social practices allied with that discourse. I assert that in health care policy and practice we speak of and live within the era of countervailing power. In this language and practice power is a force exercised by one actor to enforce its will against another actor against whom power is exerted. I contend that this language inculcates an individual and social passivity in which citizens rely upon various types of representatives to constitute health care for them in a manner in which they do not and cannot participate. However, this language of power and the political and social practice with which it is associated is merely a contingent, historical product. I claim that an alternative discourse of power is possible, in which power consists of the social interactions in which all of us mutually participate but no one of us can control. Power in this sense is participatory by nature, and because no one is in control, it makes no sense to relegate tasks to specialized, nonparticipatory domains. This alternative discourse of power, therefore, might call forth participatory practices in health careand a concomitant diminution of specialization and expansion of the public sphere. The result would be to blur the lines separating politics from everyday interaction, politics from economy, professionals from patients, and insurers from insureds. Participation would mean much more than casting a vote or writing a check but would also include the mutual sharing of time and energy in the tasks that need to be done: long-term and short-term care, practices of prevention, caringfor the chronically ill, and monitoring bureaucratic and professional activities.

CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    What's this?

This article has been cited by other articles:

				Social and Political Dis-ease Journal of Health Politics Policy and Law, January 1, 1999; 24(1): 181 - 196. [PDF]

				D. M. Frankford Regulating Managed Care: Pulling the Tails to Wag the Dogs Journal of Health Politics Policy and Law, January 1, 1999; 24(5): 1191 - 1200. [PDF]

				D. W. Light The Rhetorics and Realities of Community Health Care: The Limits of Countervailing Powers toMeet the Health Care Needs of the Twenty-first Century Journal of Health Politics Policy and Law, January 1, 1997; 22(1): 105 - 145. [Abstract] [PDF]

				L. A. Aday and S. H. Linder "Community" as the Ideal for Health Care Reform Journal of Health Politics Policy and Law, January 1, 1997; 22(1): 231 - 243. [PDF]