Encouraging students and researchers to use mainstream sociological thought to inform and deepen their knowledge and understanding of the many arenas of health and healthcare, this text discusses and critically reviews the work of several influential contemporary thinkers, including – Foucault, Bauman, Habermas, Luhmann, Bourdieu, Merleau-Ponty, Wallerstein, Archer, Deleuze, Guattari, and Castells.
Each chapter includes a critical introduction to the central theses of a major social theorist, ways in which their ideas might inform medical sociology and some worked examples of how their ideas can be applied. Containing contributions from established scholars, rising stars and innovative practitioners, this book is a valuable read for those studying and researching the sociology of health and illness.

List of illustrations vii

List of contributors viii

Introduction: theory, theorists and the sociology of health 1

GRAHAM SCAMBLER

1 Foucault, health and healthcare 7

ALAN PETFRSEN

2 Consuming bodies: Zygmunt Bauman on the difference between fitness and health 20

PAUL H1GGS

3 Jiirgen Habermas: politics and morality in health and medicine 33

GEMMA EDWARDS

4 Luhmann's social systems theory, health and illness 49

BARRY GIBSON AND OLGA BOIKO

5 Bourdieu and the impact of health and illness in the Iifcworld 71

SASHA SCAMBLER

6 Merleau-Ponty, medicine and the body 87

NICK GROSSLEY

7 World systems theory and the epidemiological transition 104

MARTIN HYDE AND ANTHONY ROSIE

8 Archer, morphogenesis and the role of agency in the sociology of health inequalities 131

GRAHAM SCAMBLER

9 Deleuze and Guattari 150

NICK .J. FOX

10 Health and medicine in the information age: Gastells, informational capitalism and the network society 167

SIMON J. WILLIAMS

Index 193

中国医科院医学信息研究所