Artful Marketing: Visual and Aural Selling Practices in the Suqs (Marketplaces) of Damascus, Syria

My dissertation examines visual and aural marketing practices used by merchants in the suqs (marketplaces) of Damascus, Syria. In the busy and cramped spaces of the city’s large marketplaces, where a range of factors makes for intense economic competition, merchants must enact a kind of romance with their customers, wooing them with dazzling store displays, symbolic decorations, and creative auditory practices. This constellation of distinctively poetic selling practices is what I call ‘artful marketing’ – ways of selling which are artful both in their artistic inclinations and in the cunning ways they draw customers. I look at merchants’ displays of religious imagery and political and familial portraiture; the arrangement of merchandise into artistically patterned displays; and vendors’ street cries and other auditory practices to understand the place of artful marketing in Damascus’ suqs. I argue that these visual and aural realms of marketplace interaction work as ‘evidence’ of the trustworthiness of merchants and their businesses in ways that direct verbal expressions cannot. Because these realms are explained by merchants as decorative and pleasurable, and because they are pointedly not framed as advertising techniques, they become more credible as evidence. Artful practices can perform important work in the selling process because they exist both as decorative backdrop and as distinctive information. Ultimately, these marketing practices are more than a means to an end, for they have the potential to both fuel and reflect larger sociocultural trends in Damascus: the changing religious landscape of the city; the infusion of kinship and politics with work; and debates over the merging of religion and technology. By looking at these local selling techniques, the marketplace is revealed to be a place of meaningful action, rather than merely a site for economic transaction.Ph.D.AnthropologyUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/75854/1/lkmcclel_2.pdfhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/75854/2/lkmcclel_1.pd

Technological Change Around The World: Evidence From Heart Attack Care

International audience"Supply side" incentives to curtail health care spending are closely linked with trends in the use of costly treatments. by the Technological Change in Health Care (TECH) Research Network ABSTRACT: Although technological change is a hallmark of health care worldwide , relatively little evidence exists on whether changes in health care differ across the very different health care systems of developed countries. We present new comparative evidence on heart attack care in seventeen countries showing that technological change-changes in medical treatments that affect the quality and cost of care-is universal but has differed greatly around the world. Differences in treatment rates are greatest for costly medical technologies , where strict financing limits and other policies to restrict adoption of intensive technologies have been associated with divergences in medical practices over time. Countries appear to differ systematically in the time at which intensive cardiac procedures began to be widely used and in the rate of growth of the procedures. The differences appear to be related to economic and regulatory incentives of the health care systems and may have important economic and health consequences. H ea lt h c ar e is an i ndu st ry that is becoming part of a global economy. Biomedical knowledge and technologies are already "global" in the sense that leading physicians in all developed countries read the same journals and electronic reviews and participate in international consortia to encourage best practices. For the most part, the same drugs and devices are available worldwide, at least within a few years of each other. Leading clinical researchers and experts collaborate internationally; leading drug and biotechnology firms think globally. As worldwide policy interest in quality of care continues to rise, international comparisons of health care systems are becoming common. Yet health care also remains a local industry, with care delivered by physicians influenced by their local peers, practice settings, and health care policies

The Relationship Between Health Policies, Medical Technology Trends and Outcomes: A Perspective from the TECH Global Research Network

International audienceThe goal of this paper is to present new comparative evidence on heart attack care in 17 countries showing that changes in medical treatments are universal, but have differed greatly. We have collected a large body of comparable information that show how countries differ in treatment rates and why these differences are relatively marked. Countries appear to differ systematically in the time at which intensive cardiac procedures began to be widely used and in the rate of growth of the procedures. Our results show that differences in treatment rates are greatest for expensive medical technologies. Also strict financing limits and regulatory policies have affected the adoption of intensive technologies. These differences may have important economic and health consequences

The influence of economic incentives and regulatory factors on the adoption of treatment technologies: a case study of technologies used to treat heart attacks

International audienceThe Technological Change in Health Care Research Network collected unique patient-level data on three procedures for treatment of heart attack patients (catheterization, coronary artery bypass grafts and percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty) for 17 countries over a 15-year period to examine the impact of economic and institutional factors on technology adoption. Specific institutional factors are shown to be important to the uptake of these technologies. Health-care systems characterized as public contract systems and reimbursement systems have higher adoption rates than public-integrated health-care systems. Central control of funding of investments is negatively associated with adoption rates and the impact is of the same magnitude as the overall health-care system classification. GDP per capita also has a strong role in initial adoption. The impact of income and institutional characteristics on the utilization rates of the three procedures diminishes over time