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In this long-awaited episode, originally recorded in Fall 2022, Joseph Harris sits down with Dr. James Pfeiffer, Professor of Global Health and Anthropology at University of Washington. They talk about global health work in Mozambique; World Bank and IMF structural adjustment programs; debt and austerity and their impact on development; and the movement to decolonize global health.

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In this podcast episode, Joseph Harris sits down with University of Illinois-Chicago Professor of Sociology Claire Decoteau. They discuss her latest book - Emergency: COVID-19 and the Uneven Valuation of Life - which explores how and why the city of Chicago failed to protect its most vulnerable citizens in its pandemic response. In the process, they explore the changing landscape of global health and sociology and the implications for democracy and health.

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Many health systems around the world rely on community health workers (CHWs) who play vital roles in health promotion, disease prevention, and primary care. While CHWs in some countries are not paid or receive only small stipends and operate without a great deal of support, guidance, or professional standards, one global movement is trying to change that. In this episode, Joseph Harris sits down with Dr. Lennie Bazira - a medical doctor and Policy Director for the Community Health Impact Coalition (CHIC) - and Jannet Otieno - a community health worker in Kenya. CHIC's membership includes thousands of CHWs and dozens of health organizations in 60+ countries who are working to make professional CHWs the norm worldwide by changing guidelines, funding, and policy. They discuss the important work community health workers do and the challenges involved in making change. 

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In this episode, Joseph Harris sits down with University of Chicago sociologist Jenny Trinitapoli. They discuss her new book, An Epidemic of Uncertainty, which explores how young adults negotiate relationships, sex, and childbearing in the context of the AIDS epidemic in Malawi, one of the world's hardest hit nations. Her landmark book draws attention not only to the uncertainty young people face in relation to their HIV status (nearly 60% of the women studied reported that they did not know if they would be infected with HIV in the next two years), but the profound uncertainty they experience in their everyday lives, having to navigate challenges that include food shortages, adequate shelter, and lightning strikes.  

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In this episode, Joseph Harris sits down with University of Pennsylvania physician and sociologist Victor Roy. They discuss the issues that are at the core of Dr. Roy's new book, Capitalizing a Cure: How Finance Controls the Price and Value of Medicines, which is available for free online through open access. The discussion covers the financialization of healthcare and medicine and the impact that finance has had on drug pricing and access, including for Hepatitis C treatment, which has a $90,000 price tag but costs just $100 to manufacture. An important thread explores the need to follow the money in global health research and the Health and Political Economy Project, which Dr. Roy directs.

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In this episode of the Global Health Politics Podcast, Joseph Harris sits down with University of Pennsylvania political scientist Julia Lynch to discuss her work on politics, pandemics, public health, inequality, and social policy. Our wide-ranging conversation explores the role of political science in understanding the political economy of health and two of her recent books - Regimes of Inequality: The Political Economy of Health and Wealth and The Unequal Pandemic: COVID-19 and Health Inequalities.

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In this episode, Joseph Harris explores the actions taken by the Trump administration to dismantle U.S. foreign aid and the consequences that these actions will have for global health. He sits down with Dr. Beth Cameron, a former Senior Adviser to the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID); Nidhi Bouri, former Deputy Assistant Administrator at USAID; Dr. Brooke Nichols, Associate Professor of Global Health at Boston University and creator of as U.S. aid freeze impact tracker; and Sheena Adams, Global Communications Director for The Accountability Lab, which launched its own Global Aid Freeze Tracker. 

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In this episode of the Global Health Politics Podcast, I sit down with Brown University political scientist Prerna Singh to discuss her latest book project, Moral Vaccination: How Ideas and Institutions Controlled Contagion in China and India. Our wide-ranging conversation explores how states generate compliance with public health interventions, grounded in a comparison of India and China's efforts to eradicate smallpox. Her important work suggests the need to incorporate a broader understanding of human motivations that goes beyond economic rationality, drawing on insights from a range of academic disciplines. Dr. Singh is past President of the Comparative Politics Section of the American Political Science Association.

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In this episode of the Global Health Politics Podcast, I sit down with Georgetown University anthropologist Emily Mendenhall to discuss her book, Unmasked: COVID, Community, and the Case of Okoboji. We talk about her past work on non-communicable diseases, particularly diabetes and mental health, and her concept of syndemics, which examines how multiple health and social conditions intersect.

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In this episode of the Global Health Politics Podcast, I sit down with UC-Berkeley Sociologist Ann Swidler to learn from her more than two decades of experience studying the aid industry, global health, culture, and institutions in Malawi amid the HIV/AIDS pandemic.