XIX ISA World Congress of Sociology (July 15-21, 2018)

JS-26

Health Professions: Future International Directions. Part One

RC52 Sociology of Professional Groups (host committee)
RC15 Sociology of Health

Language: English

This session focuses on the health professions in a global context – including the global south as well as north. It particularly centres on likely future regulatory directions that may be taken by the healthcare labour force, based on historical and contemporary developments in the health division of labour. Key questions covered will include: How do we ensure that professional health regulation meets public interest concerns in considering power and justice in both dystopian and utopian futures? How best do we promote more expansive and inclusive public participation mechanisms for users in healthcare? What might be the future role in healthcare of currently high status, but besieged, professional groups like doctors? And what does the future hold for other health professions like nurses and other allied health professions? What too might their future links be to relatively unsung but vital support workers in the healthcare labour force that are more closely linked to the precariat? At a wider level, what might be the effects of trends such as corporatization, deprofessionalization, hybridization and restratification on the health professions?  And how important in shaping the future professional division of labour in health systems will be factors like knowledge, technology, and professional leadership? This session invites single country and comparative papers which consider these and other issues at an empirical and/or theoretical level – drawing out the implications where appropriate for policy development and practice in national, international and wider global settings.