Department of Health Ethics and Society, Maastricht University/CAPHRI, Maastricht, The Netherlands.
Soc Sci Med. 2011 Jun;72(11):1838-45. doi: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2011.03.043. Epub 2011 May 1.
Biomedical and public health researchers and practitioners routinely record and comment on ethnicity: however, the use of this category is often vague and without explicit statement on what ethnicity is or how it correlates to health disparities. Presented here is an inquiry into the case of ethnicity in HIV/STI research in the Netherlands. This paper considers the construction and operationalization of the concept ethnicity in HIV/STI epidemiological research in the Netherlands. The concept ethnicity is followed as it is defined, measured, categorized, communicated and constructed in the annual national HIV/STI surveillance report of the Dutch National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) and as this construction co-evolves in society through the Dutch media, politics and prevention practice. The epidemiological work of the RIVM on HIV/STI in The Netherlands has resulted in the materialization of a distinct ethnic construction, the high risk sexual ethnic other, presumed, not only to be at heightened risk for HIV, but also to spread HIV in the Netherlands through promiscuity and absent safe sex practices. This construct is shown to be perpetually self-validating as it informs methodological choices, such that, behavioural studies almost always establish ethnic behavioural differences. The construct and related ethnic rhetoric also allow for the extrapolation of "findings" within a specific ethnic group regarding a specific STI to all groups considered ethnic minorities and so a categorical ethnic minority problem group is constructed within Dutch society. This imagery is disseminated through newspaper articles and dialogue in the Dutch House of Representative and HIV/STI prevention practice, through which the construct is reaffirmed and ascribed scientific and social validity. Knowledge of ethnic minorities' high-risk status and their sexual practices that lead to this become common, and so the construct is further operationalized in government budget planning and subsequent research programmes.
然而，这种分类的使用往往是模糊的，没有明确说明种族是什么，以及它与健康差异有何关联。本文探讨了荷兰 HIV/性传播感染（STI）研究中种族问题的案例。本文考虑了在荷兰 HIV/STI 流行病学研究中构建和操作种族概念的问题。本文将按照种族概念的定义、测量、分类、交流和构建的方式进行跟踪，该概念在荷兰国家公共卫生和环境研究所（RIVM）的年度全国 HIV/STI 监测报告中进行定义、测量、分类、交流和构建，并且该构建方式通过荷兰媒体、政治和预防实践在社会中共同演变。RIVM 在荷兰进行的 HIV/STI 流行病学工作导致了一种独特的种族构建，即高危性行为的少数民族群体，他们不仅被认为感染 HIV 的风险更高，而且还通过滥交和缺乏安全性行为在荷兰传播 HIV。事实证明，这种构建方式是自我验证的，因为它影响了方法选择，例如，行为研究几乎总是会确定种族行为差异。这种构建方式和相关的种族言论也允许将特定 STI 特定种族群体的“发现”推断为所有被认为是少数民族的群体，从而在荷兰社会中构建了一个分类的少数民族问题群体。这种形象通过报纸文章和荷兰众议院的对话以及 HIV/STI 预防实践进行传播，通过这些渠道，该构建方式得到了重申，并被赋予了科学和社会的有效性。少数民族的高风险状况及其导致这种状况的性行为变得众所周知，因此，该构建方式在政府预算规划和随后的研究计划中得到了进一步的操作化。
