Global Health Governance: Conflicts on Global Social Rights

This paper analyses the impact of new institutional structures in global health governance on the realization of social rights in poor countries. Meanwhile, health is broadly seen as an import precondition for social and economic development. This leads to an integration of the “diseases of the poor” (basically infectious diseases) into strategies of fighting poverty. Considering the example of global HIV/AIDS politics, the paper argues that new governance modes increase the participation of civil society groups and affected communities, but that they are also frequently instrumentalised by powerful actors to pursue their particular interests. In fact, increasing resources are mobilized for the fight against poverty related diseases. The paper concludes that global health governance is characterized by a combination of moral values and material interests which does not guarantee a comprehensive realization of social rights, but which allows some progress in the fight against poverty-related diseases – a precondition of the possible further realization of social rights.Global Health Governance; New Governance Modes, International Organizations, Social Rights, Global Social Justice, Developing Countries, HIV/AIDS Politics

Global Health Governance: Conflicts on Global Social Rights

This paper analyses the impact of new institutional structures in global health governance on the realization of social rights in poor countries. Meanwhile, health is broadly seen as an import precondition for social and economic development. This leads to an integration of the “diseases of the poor” (basically infectious diseases) into strategies of fighting poverty. Considering the example of global HIV/AIDS politics, the paper argues that new governance modes increase the participation of civil society groups and affected communities, but that they are also frequently instrumentalised by powerful actors to pursue their particular interests. In fact, increasing resources are mobilized for the fight against poverty related diseases. The paper concludes that global health governance is characterized by a combination of moral values and material interests which does not guarantee a comprehensive realization of social rights, but which allows some progress in the fight against poverty-related diseases – a precondition of the possible further realization of social rights.Global Health Governance; New Governance Modes, International Organizations; Social Rights; Global Social Justice; Developing Countries; HIV/AIDS Politics

Global health governance: conflicts on global social rights

This article analyses the impact of new institutional structures in global health governance (GHG) on the realization of social rights in poor countries. Focusing on the example of global HIV/AIDS politics. The article argues that new governance modes increase the participation of civil society groups and affected communities, but also that they are frequently instrumentalized by powerful actors to pursue their particular interests. In fact, increasing resources are mobilized for the fight against poverty-related diseases. The article concludes that, as the experience of HIV/AIDS politics, the conflicts around the TRIPS Agreement and the development of Global Public-Private Partnerships GPPPs suggest, GHG is characterized by a combination of moral values and material interests that does not guarantee a comprehensive realization of social rights, but which allows some progress in the fight against poverty-related diseases - a step toward realization of social rights

Conflicts About Intellectual Property Claims: The Role and Function of Collective Action Networks

The outcomes of two recent policy conflicts about two EU directives on intellectual property rights question the assumptions of interest groups research: Why were weak actors able to successfully mobilize against one directive but failed in the other case? We argue that, to explain policy influence, the existing literature focuses only on actor characteristics but neglects actor relations and is therefore not able to explain the success of weak actors in certain conflicts. We employ social network analysis to analyze the actor networks of both conflicts and conclude that a broad mobilization in combination with a dense network and the construction of a convincing master frame are conditions for successful campaigning and influence of weak actors. In more abstract terms we can see that in order to be successful weak actors have to built situational coalitions that fulfill the conditions of a collective actor with a recognizable collective identity

Conflicts about intellectual property claims: the role and function of collective action networks

Decision making processes in Europe involve complex networks of actors who are trying to influence them on the various levels of the European multi-level governance system. Interest group research often assumes that the ability of an actor to exert influence depends mainly on its financial and personal resourcefulness, on its ability to provide expert knowledge and on its economic and/or political power. Recent conflicts in which “weak” actors were able to persist have challenged this assumption. We claim that a careful analysis of the actor networks is able to complement the traditional actor-resource-centered perspective, and that paying attention to the structure of collective action networks is necessary to fully grasp the dynamics of decision-making processes in Europe in which the power of networks sometime outweighs the power of resources.24226217