Kelley Lee – författare

The World Health Organization (WHO), as the United Nations specialized agency for health, has been at the centre of international health cooperation for over sixty years. With origins dating from the nineteenth century, WHO’s mandate is the attainment by all people of the highest possible level of health. The huge challenge of fulfilling this objective has not only required high-level technical skills, but has led the organization to engage with a broad range of political and economic interests. WHO has enjoyed many high-profile successes such as the global eradication of smallpox and SARS, and ongoing campaigns against polio and other diseases. On other issues, such as essential drugs, tobacco control and diet and nutrition, efforts to tackle the broader determinants of health has brought the organization into contact with issues such as globalization, poverty, social justice and human rights.

Kelley Lee analyzes the WHO’s role in international cooperation, examining its changing structures, key programmes and individuals. Of particular focus are the challenges WHO has faced in recent years given the emergence of other global health initiatives and how WHO has sought to remain effective as the "world’s health conscience" within an increasingly complex global context.

The World Health Organization (WHO), as the United Nations specialized agency for health, has been at the centre of international health cooperation for over sixty years. With origins dating from the nineteenth century, WHO’s mandate is the attainment by all people of the highest possible level of health. The huge challenge of fulfilling this objective has not only required high-level technical skills, but has led the organization to engage with a broad range of political and economic interests. WHO has enjoyed many high-profile successes such as the global eradication of smallpox and SARS, and ongoing campaigns against polio and other diseases. On other issues, such as essential drugs, tobacco control and diet and nutrition, efforts to tackle the broader determinants of health has brought the organization into contact with issues such as globalization, poverty, social justice and human rights.

Kelley Lee analyzes the WHO’s role in international cooperation, examining its changing structures, key programmes and individuals. Of particular focus are the challenges WHO has faced in recent years given the emergence of other global health initiatives and how WHO has sought to remain effective as the "world’s health conscience" within an increasingly complex global context.

In an era of rapid and extensive globalisation, the world faces a wide range of transboundary problems that require effective collective action. Key among these are threats to human health that do not recognise national borders, and include emerging and re-emerging infections, rising rates of chronic diseases, inadequate access to affordable and safe medicines, spreading anti-microbial resistance and the health effects of climate change. These threats require a transnational response and thus pose significant challenges to global health governance, as well as to long established notions of national sovereignty.

This book investigates the neglected question of the impact of a rising Asia on the management of transboundary health problems. The chapters examine the role played by Asia in the governance of a range of global health issues, from development assistance in health, to global health instruments dealing with tobacco control and disease outbreaks, to health research and knowledge products, and the book concludes by examining the broad themes of a rising Asia’s role in the complexity of global health governance. The various analyses are tied together by a common focus on Asian countries’ use of the sovereignty principle, and seek to understand how traditional notions of national sovereignty can both clash with, and enhance, governance objectives in global health. In addition, the contributors examine the interaction between global, regional and domestic institutions, and present current ideas in Asia on the challenge of governing global health.

With an inter-disciplinary approach that combines international relations, public policy and public health, this book will be invaluable to both scholars and policy makers working in these fields, as well as Asian politics, social policy and governance more generally.

In an era of rapid and extensive globalisation, the world faces a wide range of transboundary problems that require effective collective action. Key among these are threats to human health that do not recognise national borders, and include emerging and re-emerging infections, rising rates of chronic diseases, inadequate access to affordable and safe medicines, spreading anti-microbial resistance and the health effects of climate change. These threats require a transnational response and thus pose significant challenges to global health governance, as well as to long established notions of national sovereignty.

This book investigates the neglected question of the impact of a rising Asia on the management of transboundary health problems. The chapters examine the role played by Asia in the governance of a range of global health issues, from development assistance in health, to global health instruments dealing with tobacco control and disease outbreaks, to health research and knowledge products, and the book concludes by examining the broad themes of a rising Asia’s role in the complexity of global health governance. The various analyses are tied together by a common focus on Asian countries’ use of the sovereignty principle, and seek to understand how traditional notions of national sovereignty can both clash with, and enhance, governance objectives in global health. In addition, the contributors examine the interaction between global, regional and domestic institutions, and present current ideas in Asia on the challenge of governing global health.

With an inter-disciplinary approach that combines international relations, public policy and public health, this book will be invaluable to both scholars and policy makers working in these fields, as well as Asian politics, social policy and governance more generally.

Globalisation is influencing not only patterns of health and disease worldwide, but how decisions on health are made and organised. This is the arena of ‘Global Health Governance’. Despite some successes in developing better global governance for health, progress overall has been disappointingly slow. This is especially so given the number of health crises today, some of which are long standing but others relatively new.

This book explores how progress has often been limited, but also on occasion assisted, by the role of ideas. It identifies how health issues, such as HIV/AIDS, pandemic influenza and tobacco control, are framed in such a way as to resonate with a set of ideas, or worldviews, associated with particular policy communities. A successful framing can generate possibilities for action, but can also lead to competition when ideas conflict or suggest different pathways of response. Global Health Governance therefore is an arena of competition as well as cooperation, where ideas matter as well as resources and political will.

This book was originally published as a special issue of Global Public Health.

Globalisation is influencing not only patterns of health and disease worldwide, but how decisions on health are made and organised. This is the arena of ‘Global Health Governance’. Despite some successes in developing better global governance for health, progress overall has been disappointingly slow. This is especially so given the number of health crises today, some of which are long standing but others relatively new.

This book explores how progress has often been limited, but also on occasion assisted, by the role of ideas. It identifies how health issues, such as HIV/AIDS, pandemic influenza and tobacco control, are framed in such a way as to resonate with a set of ideas, or worldviews, associated with particular policy communities. A successful framing can generate possibilities for action, but can also lead to competition when ideas conflict or suggest different pathways of response. Global Health Governance therefore is an arena of competition as well as cooperation, where ideas matter as well as resources and political will.

This book was originally published as a special issue of Global Public Health.