Assistant Professor of Kinesiology Research Associate, Rock Ethics, 268H Rec Hall, 16802, University Park, PA, United States.
Professor Emeritus of Food Science Senior Fellow, Rock Ethics Institute, 407 Rodney A. Erickson Food Science Building, 16802, University Park, PA, United States.
Med Health Care Philos. 2022 Sep;25(3):371-382. doi: 10.1007/s11019-022-10084-1. Epub 2022 Jun 9.
We argue that an unqualified use of the term solidarity in public health is not only equivocal but problematic toward the ends of public health. The term may be deployed normatively by public health advocates to strengthen the bonds among public health practitioners and refer to an ideal society in which the importance of interdependence among members ought to be acknowledged throughout the polity. We propose an important distinction between partisan solidarity and societal solidarity. Because any moralized belief in a vision of a broad societal solidarity will be a contested political ideal, political reality would limit solidarity based on such a vision to partisan solidarity. An idealized vision of societal solidarity is simply not politically feasible in pluralistic, liberal, democratic societies. However, although societal solidarity is unlikely with respect to any particular policy, it might be hoped for with respect to constitutional procedures that provide boundaries for the agon of the political process. We suggest that moralizing assertions of a solidaristic ideal in a pluralistic society might be counterproductive to generating the political support necessary for public health per se and establishing legitimate public health policy. A pragmatic political approach would be for public health advocates to generate sufficient strong political support for those public health policies that are most amenable to the political and social realities of a time and place.
我们认为，在公共卫生领域不加区分地使用“团结”一词不仅含糊不清，而且不利于实现公共卫生的目标。该术语可能被公共卫生倡导者规范地用来加强公共卫生从业者之间的联系，并指的是一个理想社会，在这个社会中，成员之间相互依存的重要性应该在整个政治体中得到承认。我们提出了党派团结和社会团结之间的重要区别。因为任何对广泛社会团结愿景的道德化信仰都将是一个有争议的政治理想，政治现实将把基于这种愿景的团结限制在党派团结之内。理想化的社会团结愿景在多元化、自由和民主的社会中根本不具有政治可行性。然而，尽管就任何特定政策而言，社会团结不太可能，但人们可能希望宪法程序能为政治进程的争论提供界限。我们认为，在多元化社会中对团结理想进行道德化断言，可能不利于为公共卫生本身和制定合法的公共卫生政策产生必要的政治支持。一种务实的政治方法是，让公共卫生倡导者为那些最能适应特定时间和地点的政治和社会现实的公共卫生政策争取足够强大的政治支持。
