The Role of Risk Assessment in Public Health Policy Decisions

2002 ◽  
pp. 257-273
Author(s):  
Kofi Asante-Duah
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Risk Assessment ◽  
Health Policy ◽  
Public Health Policy ◽  
Policy Decisions

Litigation as Public Health Policy: Theory or Reality?

2002 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 224-238 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter D. Jacobson ◽  
Soheil Soliman
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Public Policy ◽  
Health Policy ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Public Health Policy ◽  
Empirical Support ◽  
Class Action ◽  
Policy Theory ◽  
Health Goals

An ongoing debate among legal scholars and public health advocates is the role of litigation in shaping public policy. For the most part, the debate has been waged at a conceptual level, with opponents and proponents arguing within fairly well-defined boundaries. The debate has been based either on speculation of what litigation could achieve or on ideological grounds as to why litigation should or should not be used this way. With the exception of Rosenberg's study of how litigation shaped policy in civil rights, abortion, and environmental matters, there is almost no empirical support for either position.In recent years, the most ardent proponents of litigation as public policy have been public health advocates. Perhaps out of frustration with the inability to achieve desired public health goals through the legislative branch of government, public health advocates have pursued litigation as an alternative strategy. Beginning with tobacco class action litigation in the early 1990s and continuing with litigation against gun manufacturers at the end of that decade, public health advocates have waged a veritable litigation assault aimed at changing how public health policy is formed.

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