Uneven inclusion

Consequences of universal healthcare in Thailand

Bibliographic Data

ID4940299
AuthorsJoseph Harris (0000-0002-7458-6580, University of Chicago, corresponding author)
Year2013
Volume17
Issue1
Pages111-127
Publication date2013-02-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueCitizenship Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1362-1025 • E-ISSN: 1469-3593
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/13621025.2013.764220
OpenAlexW2087582926
LanguageEN
Citations received15
References cited12

‘Post-national’ scholars have taken the extension of social rights to migrants that are normally accorded to citizens as evidence of the growing importance of norms of ‘universal personhood’ and the declining importance of the nation-state. However, the distinct approach taken by the state toward another understudied category of non-citizen – stateless people – complicates these theories by demonstrating that the state makes decisions about groups on different bases than theory would suggest. These findings suggest the need to pay more attention to how the state treats other categories of ‘semi-citizens’. This article examines the differential effects of universal healthcare reforms in Thailand on citizens, migrants, and stateless people and explores their ramifications on theories of citizenship and social rights. While the state has expanded its healthcare obligations toward people living within its borders, it has taken a variegated approach toward different groups. Citizens have been extended ‘differentiated but unambiguous rights’. Migrants have been granted ‘conditional rights’ to healthcare coverage, dependent on their status as registered workers who pay mandatory contributions. Large numbers of stateless people, however, saw their right to state welfare programs disenfranchised following passage of the new universal healthcare law before later being granted ‘contingent rights’ through a new program

Citizenship · Health care · Human rights · Law and economics · Personhood · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Social rights · Sociology · Stateless protocol · Statelessness · Welfare state · Gender Studies · Law · Migration, Refugees, and Integration · Southeast Asian Sociopolitical Studies · Turkey's Politics and Society

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