Thinking Politically About UN Political Declarations: A Recipe for Healthier Commitments—Free of Commercial Interests Comment on "Competing Frames in Global Health Governance: An Analysis of Stakeholder Influence on the Political Declaration on Non-communicable Diseases"

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kent Buse ◽  
Mélissa Mialon ◽  
Alexandra Jones
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Policy Making ◽  
Conflicts Of Interest ◽  
Health Impacts ◽  
The Political ◽  
Global Health Governance ◽  
Health Governance ◽  
Stakeholder Influence ◽  
Corporate Actor ◽  
Independent Panel

As evidence mounts that corporate actor engagement in United Nations (UN) policy-making processes leads to weaker and shallower public health commitments, greater attention is being paid to how to minimise undue interference and manage conflicts of interest (CoI). While we welcome efforts to develop normative guidance on managing such conflicts, we argue that there is the need to go further. In particular, we propose that an index be developed that would assess the health impacts of individual corporate actors, and those actors who fail to achieve a set benchmark would not have engagement privileges. We further propose the establishment of an independent panel of experts to advise on corporate actor engagement as well as on ambiguous and potentially health-harming commitments in text under negotiation in the UN. Recognising that the implementation of such measures will be contested, we recommend a number of practical steps to make their implementation more politically palatable.

scholarly journals Public-Private Partnerships With Unhealthy Commodity Industries: Are They Undermining Real Progress in Non-Communicable Disease Prevention? Competing Frames in Global Health Governance: An Analysis of Stakeholder Influence on the Political Declaration on Non-communicable Diseases

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chiara Rinaldi
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Disease Prevention ◽  
Conflicts Of Interest ◽  
Communicable Disease ◽  
Public Private Partnerships ◽  
Health Governance ◽  
Stakeholder Influence ◽  
Public Health Promotion ◽  
Public Health Strategies ◽  
Non Communicable Disease

Public-private partnerships (PPPs) and whole-of-society approaches are increasingly common in public health promotion and non-communicable disease prevention, despite a lack of evidence in favour of their effectiveness in improving health outcomes. While PPPs may have advantages, they also give industry actors more influence over the design and implementation of public health strategies and interventions. Partnering with unhealthy commodity industries in particular – including the alcohol and ultra-processed food and beverages industries – can pose significant risks to public health due to these industries’ deep-rooted conflicts of interest. In this commentary, I reiterate Suzuki et al.’s message about the importance of assessing and managing conflicts of interest before engaging with non-state actors through PPPs or other forms of engagement.

"A Promise Unfulfilled": Stakeholder Influence and the 2018 UN High-Level Meeting on NCDs; Comment on "Competing Frames in Global Health Governance: an Analysis of Stakeholder Influence on the Political Declaration on Non-Communicable Diseases

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Johanna Ralston
Keyword(s):  
Global Health ◽  
Private Sector ◽  
Communicable Diseases ◽  
Noncommunicable Diseases ◽  
The Political ◽  
Global Health Governance ◽  
Health Governance ◽  
Non Communicable Diseases ◽  
Stakeholder Influence ◽  
High Level

In recognition of the global burden of noncommunicable diseases (NCDs), the past decade has seen three U.N. High Level Meetings on NCDs. Yet progress in terms of political or financial commitments has been very slow. At the 2018 meeting, a political declaration was approved but featured language that had been watered down in terms of commitments. In "Competing Frames of Global Health Governance: An Analysis of Stakeholder Influence on the Political Declaration on Non-communicable Diseases," Suzuki et al analyze the documents that were submitted by Member States, NGOs and the private sector during the consultation period and conclude that the private sector and several high-income countries appeared to oppose regulatory frameworks for products associated with NCDs , that wealthier countries resisted financing commitments, and that general power asymmetries affected the final document. This comment supports their findings and provides additional considerations for why the NCD response has yet to produce significant commitments.

scholarly journals Lacking Clarity or Strategic Ambiguity? Comment on "Competing Frames in Global Health Governance: An Analysis of Stakeholder Influence on the Political Declaration on Non-Communicable Diseases"

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Angela Carriedo ◽  
Kathrin Lauber ◽  
Margaret M. Miller ◽  
Rob Ralston
Keyword(s):  
Global Health ◽  
Conflicts Of Interest ◽  
Communicable Diseases ◽  
The Political ◽  
Global Health Governance ◽  
Health Governance ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Non Communicable Diseases ◽  
Multi Stakeholder ◽  
Public And Private Sector

This commentary engages with Suzuki and colleagues’ analysis about the ambiguity of multi-stakeholder discourses in the United Nations (UN) Political Declaration of the 3rd High-Level Meeting of the General Assembly on the Prevention and Control of Non-Communicable Diseases (HLM-NCDs), suggesting that blurring between public and private sector in this declaration reflects broader debates about multi-stakeholder partnerships (MSPs) and public-private partnerships (PPPs) in health governance. We argue that the ambiguity between the roles and responsibilities of public and private actors involved may downplay the role (and regulation) of conflicts of interest (COI) between unhealthy commodity industries and public health. We argue that this ambiguity is not simply an artefact of the Political Declaration process, but a feature of multi-stakeholderism, which assumes that commercial actors´ interests can be aligned with the public interest. To safeguard global health governance, we recommend further empirical and conceptual research on COI and how it can be managed.

Human Rights in Global Health

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary Robinson
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Global Health ◽  
Global Governance ◽  
World Health ◽  
Global Health Governance ◽  
Health Governance ◽  
Structural Determinants ◽  
Organizational Policies ◽  
Governmental Organizations

Institutions matter for the advancement of human rights in global health. Given the dramatic development of human rights under international law and the parallel proliferation of global institutions for public health, there arises an imperative to understand the implementation of human rights through global health governance. This volume examines the evolving relationship between human rights, global governance, and public health, studying an expansive set of health challenges through a multi-sectoral array of global organizations. To analyze the structural determinants of rights-based governance, the organizations in this volume include those international bureaucracies that implement human rights in ways that influence public health in a globalizing world. Bringing together leading health and human rights scholars and practitioners from academia, non-governmental organizations, and the United Nations system, this volume explores: (1) the foundations of human rights as a normative framework for global health governance, (2) the mandate of the World Health Organization to pursue a human rights-based approach to health, (3) the role of inter-governmental organizations across a range of health-related human rights, (4) the influence of rights-based economic governance on public health, and (5) the focus on global health among institutions of human rights governance. Contributing chapters map the distinct human rights activities within a specific institution of global governance for health. Through the comparative institutional analysis in this volume, the contributing authors examine institutional efforts to operationalize human rights in organizational policies, programs, and practices and assess institutional factors that facilitate or inhibit human rights mainstreaming for global health advancement.

From Alma Ata to the SDG s

2020 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 176-197 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Weber
Keyword(s):  
Global Health ◽  
Sustainable Development Goals ◽  
Medical Profession ◽  
Final Analysis ◽  
The Political ◽  
Global Health Governance ◽  
Health Governance ◽  
Community Activists ◽  
Development Goals ◽  
Year 2000

Abstract The Alma Ata Declaration of 1978 proclaimed “health for all by the year 2000.” In 2019 health is mainstreamed through the United Nations’ 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG s) initiative. Contributing to critical analysis of global health governance (GHG), this article reconstructs the normative premises of the Alma Ata Declaration, the political project it represented, and the successful cases it was inspired by. It contrasts this with an account of the emergence and gradual consolidation of the GHG agenda that is today reflected in the SDG s. The calls for a return to the Alma Ata Declaration resonate strongly among human rights advocates, community activists, and the medical profession. This is because of the socially exclusionary effects of the dominant health governance agenda shaped by distinctively neoliberal premises. The article argues that in the final analysis the two different approaches reflect very different ideas and ideals about “who global health governance is for.”

scholarly journals Beware the Kindleberger Trap in Global Health Governance

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-21
Author(s):  
Jin Jiyong
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Global Health ◽  
Public Goods ◽  
Stress Test ◽  
The United States ◽  
Global Health Governance ◽  
Global Public Health ◽  
Global Public Goods ◽  
Health Governance ◽  
Health Crisis

The Covid-19 pandemic is both a public health crisis and a stress test for global health governance. Effective health governance hinges on the provision of global public goods for health. Generally, the hegemon underwrites the operation and stability of the global public health architecture by ensuring the sustained supply of global public goods for health. But when the hegemon is unable or unwilling to shoulder this responsibility, global health governance may run the risk of falling into a Kindleberger Trap. The leadership vacuum that is opening up amid the coronavirus pandemic is accelerating the process. At present, China should adopt a three-pronged approach to promote bilateral health cooperation with leading countries like the United States, strengthen regional institution-building with ASEAN, South Korea, Japan, and Belt and Road countries, and improve the performance, credibility, and integrity of global organizations like the WHO and G-20. The Kindleberger Trap in global health governance can be overcome by adapting regional health coordination to make it more agile and effective.

scholarly journals Strengthening Human Rights in Global Health Law: Lessons from the COVID-19 Response

2021 ◽  
Vol 49 (2) ◽  
pp. 328-331
Author(s):  
Judith Bueno de Mesquita ◽  
Anuj Kapilashrami ◽  
Benjamin Mason Meier
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Global Health ◽  
Global Health Governance ◽  
Health Law ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
Health Governance ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
Public Health Emergencies ◽  
International Human

AbstractWhile human rights law has evolved to provide guidance to governments in realizing human rights in public health emergencies, the COVID-19 pandemic has challenged the foundations of human rights in global health governance. Public health responses to the pandemic have undermined international human rights obligations to realize (1) the rights to health and life, (2) human rights that underlie public health, and (3) international assistance and cooperation. As governments prepare for revisions of global health law, new opportunities are presented to harmonize global health law and human rights law, strengthening rights-based governance to respond to future threats.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document