Ethical frameworks, health-seeking and care pathways in superdiverse environments.

Datum
08. April – 11. April 2025 

Pan­el at ASA UK con­fer­ence in Birmingham

CfP for a Pan­el on „Eth­i­cal frame­works, health-seek­ing and care path­ways in super­di­verse environments”
ASA UK con­fer­ence in Birmingham
8–11th April 2025

Short Abstract:

This pan­el explores ethno­graph­i­cal­ly how ethics shapes health-seek­ing behav­iours and how health ser­vices may design care path­ways that accom­mo­date diverse moral world­views. Eth­i­cal frame­works and lived expe­ri­ence ‑espe­cial­ly in sit­u­a­tions of pre­car­i­ty- shape how peo­ple nav­i­gate health services.

Long Abstract

Eth­i­cal frame­works, health-seek­ing and care-path­ways in super­di­verse environments.

To pro­vide ade­quate ser­vices, health providers and civ­il soci­ety organ­i­sa­tions need for their care path­ways to be adapt­ed to the real­i­ty of health-seek­ing prac­tices. In turn, in super­di­verse envi­ron­ments, advice and health-seek­ing dif­fers between social groups (accord­ing to gen­der, income, race and eth­nic­i­ty, migra­tion sta­tus and so on). In cir­cum­stances of extreme pre­car­i­ty – cost of liv­ing cri­sis, in-pover­ty employ­ment, racism and dis­crim­i­na­tion, etc.- uncer­tain­ty and lived expe­ri­ence play a major role (Mac­Gre­gor et al 2020).

Peo­ple do not behave in a pre­dict­ed lin­ear fash­ion sole­ly accord­ing to their socio-demo­graph­ic char­ac­ter­is­tics, but rather expe­ri­ence pre­car­i­ous life and deal with emer­gent and unex­pect­ed chal­lenges and pri­or­i­ties of an uncer­tain envi­ron­ment (Al-Moham­mad and Pelu­so 2012). In turn peo­ple prac­tice moral nav­i­ga­tion, adapt­ing and reassess­ing their val­ues, pri­or­i­ties and health deci­sions as their ther­a­peu­tic itin­er­ary unfolds, rather than fol­low­ing fixed path­ways (White and Jha 2021). 

People’s eth­i­cal frame­works – how they behave as eth­i­cal agents, moral­ly bound to oth­ers (their peers, their fam­i­lies, etc.)- shape how peo­ple seek health advice and their deci­sions when engag­ing with health providers and pub­lic ser­vices (Ripoll et al 2022).

This pan­el is seek­ing ethno­graph­ic papers that con­tribute to the fol­low­ing questions:

– How do people’s moral and eth­i­cal demands shape their health-seek­ing practices?
– Do peo­ple face moral conun­drums when decid­ing to make par­tic­u­lar deci­sions in health care or in and how do they
– What role does uncer­tain­ty and emer­gence play in this moral nav­i­ga­tion of health services?
– How do health ser­vice providers take into account people’s moral lives when assess­ing people’s nav­i­ga­tion of health services?
– Can care path­ways be adapt­ed to the dif­fer­ent moral world­views of the peo­ple they wish to sup­port through the health system?

This pan­el will aim to bring togeth­er ethno­graph­ic insights from the field of anthro­pol­o­gy of ethics with applied anthro­pol­o­gy in the con­text of health.

Ref­er­ences:

Al-Moham­mad, H., & Pelu­so, D. (2012). Ethics and the “rough ground” of the every­day: the over­lap­pings of life in postin­va­sion Iraq. HAU: Jour­nal of Ethno­graph­ic The­o­ry, 2(2), 42–58.

Mac­Gre­gor, H., Ripoll, S., & Leach, M. (2020). Dis­ease out­breaks: nav­i­gat­ing uncer­tain­ties in pre­pared­ness and response. Tay­lor and Francis.

Ripoll, S., Ouvri­er, A., Hryn­ick, T., & Schmidt-Sane, M. (2022). Vac­cine Equi­ty in Mul­ti­cul­tur­al Urban Set­tings. A com­par­a­tive analy­sis of local gov­ern­ment and com­mu­ni­ty action, con­tex­tu­alised polit­i­cal economies, and moral frame­works in Mar­seille and London

White, S. C., & Jha, S. (2021). Moral nav­i­ga­tion and child fos­ter­ing in Chi­awa, Zam­bia. Africa, 91(2), 249–269.