Medical modernisation, scientific research fields and the epistemic politics of health social movements

Hess, David J.

doi:10.1111/j.0141-9889.2004.00414.x

Cited by 86 publications

(66 citation statements)

References 23 publications

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“…It appears that in this case, this boundary was distinctly porous as scientists felt compelled to intercede in medical education. Previous studies of boundary work in CAM have shown that medical professionals have followed a policy of expanding their practice to incorporate selected aspects of CAM (Adams, 2005, Hess 2004). However, this study demonstrates that Colquhoun and supporters instead sought to expel CAM, and homeopathy in particular, from both medicine and science.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Quackademia? Mass-Media Delegitimation of Homeopathy Education

Caldwell

2017

Science as Culture

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In response to concerns about the standards of training for non-medically qualified homeopathic practitioners, between 1999 and 2009 a number of UK universities taught Bachelor of Science (BSc) degrees in homeopathy. All the courses were subsequently closed following media coverage of a vigorous campaign from scientists against the degree courses. A boundary-work analysis of 65 articles published in the UK print media reveals the use of metaphors from a number of different fields as rhetorical strategies to malign homeopathy education. As well as the commonly used contrasts of profit versus academic integrity, rationality versus faith and logic versus magic, media reports associated homeopathy with new universities and Mickey Mouse degrees, both of which had been denigrated in the press previously. In the press coverage, much attention was also drawn to the fact that the method of repeatedly diluting homeopathic medicines defies both logic and common sense, and the plausibility argument became a decisive blow in the debate over the legitimacy of teaching homeopathy as a science degree. It seems that the boundary work sought to protect the authority of both science and medicine by expelling homeopathy from higher education. These findings contrast with previous studies that suggest that orthodox medicine has occasionally expanded to incorporate desirable aspects of complementary and alternative therapies. Scientists carry out boundary work not just to demarcate the boundaries of science and directly defend their own interests, but also to protect the authority of other allied professions.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Quackademia? Mass-Media Delegitimation of Homeopathy Education

Caldwell

2017

Science as Culture

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“…Research projects were set up on a larger scale, collaborations between several disciplines were established and 'society began to talk back to science' (Barry, 2001;Hess, 2004;Tupasela, 2007). These developments occurred in the Netherlands later in psychiatry than elsewhere in medicine.…”

Section: Starting To Conduct Psychiatric Genomics Research: On Hypothmentioning

confidence: 99%

The contingency of psychiatric genomics in a Dutch research consortium

Baart

2010

BioSocieties

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Psychiatric genomics is made in practice. Developments in psychiatric genomics are the result of an open, contingent process in which different stakeholders -scientists, policymakers, professionals and patients -are involved. This article examines the practices and perspectives of scientists in two long-term, large-scale Dutch psychiatric research consortia that are mapping the origin and development of psychosis, anxiety and depression. The article also explores the perspectives of the funding agency and patients and patient organizations that are in contact with the research consortium on psychoses. What are the issues and concerns of scientists involved in psychiatric genomics, what do they expect genomics will mean for psychiatry, what kind of research are they conducting? What are the issues, concerns and expectations of the main funding agency? How do patients and patient organizations regard developments in psychiatric genomics, and how do they relate to the ongoing research? The conclusion is that different psychiatric futures -not necessarily resulting in geneticized disorders -may emerge from multiple developments in the field. Developments in this case study appear to be contingent on international developments in scientific research; on scientists' different perspectives of what psychiatric disorders are; on national and European traditions in psychiatry, and on the input of patients and patient organizations into research.

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“…However, because it largely restricts its analyses to autonomous scientific fields in which activists are forced to conform to scientific epistemic standards so as to portray themselves as credible knowers (see Epstein 1996), it overlooks their role in fundamental epistemological debates. In less autonomous fields, like medicine, or in fields experiencing epistemological flux, social movements like homeopathy can engage in "knowledge advocacy" on fundamental epistemological grounds (Whooley 2008), offering "epistemic challenges" as they are less pressed to debate the issues on the field's own terms (Hess 2004).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Organization Formation as Epistemic Practice: The Early Epistemological Function of the American Medical Association

Whooley

2010

Qual Sociol

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This research explores how social actors adjudicate knowledge claims within intellectual environments where epistemic standards are contested. Through the case study of 19th century debates over cholera in the United States, I examine the strategies deployed by orthodox and homeopathic physicians in the struggle over medical knowledge during this "epistemic contest." The 1832 cholera epidemic ushered in a crisis for orthodox medicine, as epistemological standards for adjudicating medical knowledge claims became challenged and ill-defined. Failing to muster an effective cultural response to homeopathy, orthodoxy adopted an organizational strategy, forming the American Medical Association and offering professional membership as a proxy indicator of legitimate knowledge. The AMA created an organizational/intellectual space insulated from homeopathy, which translated into a concerted campaign to exclude homeopaths from government institutions and affected the nature of orthodox knowledge on cholera. This case reveals that epistemic contests are not waged by cultural means only; organizational practices form an integral part of actors' repertoires in adjudicating epistemological claims in practice.

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Medical modernisation, scientific research fields and the epistemic politics of health social movements

Cited by 86 publications

References 23 publications

Quackademia? Mass-Media Delegitimation of Homeopathy Education

Quackademia? Mass-Media Delegitimation of Homeopathy Education

The contingency of psychiatric genomics in a Dutch research consortium

Organization Formation as Epistemic Practice: The Early Epistemological Function of the American Medical Association

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