What choice? Risk and responsibilisation in cardiovascular health policy

Bibliographic Data

ID4218342
AuthorsJacqueline Hutchison (0000-0001-6149-6642, corresponding author), Julia Holdsworth (University of Hull)
Year2021
Volume25
Issue3
Pages288-305
Publication date2021-05-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueHealth An Interdisciplinary Journal for the Social Study of Health Illness and Medicine (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1363-4593 • E-ISSN: 1461-7196
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/1363459319886106
PMID31692388
OpenAlexW2983961786
LanguageEN
Citations received11
References cited41

Employing a policy-as-discourse approach, we explore how the language of choice, risk and responsibilisation influences cardiovascular disease policy. We analyse four key pieces of public health literature produced in the UK between 1999 and 2013 that consider the prevention and treatment of coronary heart disease: Saving Lives: Our Healthier Nation; National Service Framework for Coronary Heart Disease; Mending Hearts and Brains and Cardiovascular Disease Outcomes Strategy. This critical discourse analysis problematises how neoliberal discourses of responsibilisation, risk and choice operate to govern health practices. Textual analysis reveals there are multiple dimensions evident in the way that responsibility for health is framed. Organisations are considered responsible 'for' illness prevention strategies and service provision, while individuals are conceptualised as responsible 'to' maintain healthy lifestyles. Conceptualising individuals as responsible health-conscious consumers enables a backward-looking narrative that holds individuals to account. Furthermore analysis reveals assumptions and messages that demonstrate the operation of moral discourses around patient behaviour. We suggest moral dimensions to public health strategies obscure the structural disparities that influence healthy life chances, imposing a system of limitations and exclusions that lead to allocation of liability and attributing blame for illness

Blame · Disease · Moral responsibility · Narrative · Political science · Public health · Public relations · Sociology · Global Public Health Policies and Epidemiology · Healthcare Systems and Challenges · Law · Medicine · Nursing · Obesity and Health Practices · Psychology · Social Psychology

Tools

Open DOISci-Hub