Digital Health Futures

Digital health has become an important field of research within the sociology of health (Henwood and Marent, 2019). This research has elaborated how practices of health and medicine cope with and utilise the combined and interrelated challenges of increases in quantification (e.g. data-intensive medicine), ubiquitous connectivity (e.g. telemedicine) and unprecedented modes of instantaneous calculation (e.g. algorithmic medicine). New modes of engagement and governance are of the essence to mitigate risks and facilitate the opportunities of digital health endeavours. In this session, we aim to elaborate theoretical and methodological advances that enable us as sociologist to take part in the orchestration (Lemke, 2021) and design (Pink et al., 2022) of value-centric and desirable digital health futures. We invite contributions that develop new modes of governing digital health. These may address or expand the following strategic directions:

• Codesign processes that enable engagement with multiple collectives to continually review imaginaries and consequences of digital health.
• Affordances as a theoretical lens that traces the relationship between technological features, users and the diverse meanings or outcomes of digital health.
• The concept of generativity that can enable governance to account for the contingent, complex, and ongoing journeys through which digital health comes into being.

By exploring new modes of governance this session aims to create foundations and possibilities for promoting health in digital society.

Henwood, F., Marent, B. (eds) (2019) Digital Health: Sociological Perspectives. Wiley.

Lemke, T. (2021). The Government of Things. NYU Press.

Pink, S. et al. (2022) Design Ethnography: Research, Responsibilities and Futures. Routledge.