In the Court of Public Opinion

Transnational Problem Construction in the HIV/Aids Medicine Access Campaign, 1998–2001

Bibliographic Data

ID2354558
AuthorsThomas Olesen (0000-0002-2742-5100, Aarhus University, corresponding author)
Year2006
Volume21
Issue1
Pages5-30
Publication date2006-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueInternational Sociology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0268-5809 • E-ISSN: 1461-7242
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0268580906059288
OpenAlexW2162815900
LanguageEN
Citations received19
References cited45

This article analyses the HIV/AIDS medicine access campaign from 1998 to 2001. The campaign began when 39 of the world's largest pharmaceutical companies initiated a court case against South Africa for violating the companies' patent rights. The campaign played an important role in making the issue resonate in the public spheres of many countries around the world and thereby contributed to the pharmaceutical companies' eventual decision to withdraw the case. The main objective of the article is to provide insight into the way campaign activists sought to make the issue of HIV/AIDS medicine access of concern and intelligible to audiences not directly affected by it. Paying attention to such questions is crucial in order to reach a better understanding of current processes of globalization. The article shows how campaign discourses combined emotional and strategic elements and sought to bridge distance by connecting the universal and the particular. At the same time, it is argued that resonance was not only an outcome of the campaign's discursive activities. It was significantly aided by the fact that key campaign organizations possessed considerable economic and skill resources, and by the presence of allies such as states and international institutions

Business · Globalization · Opinion leadership · Political science · Politics · Public opinion · Public relations · Sociology · International Development and Aid · Law · Media Studies and Communication · Medicine · South African History and Culture

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