SOCI 3820 Lecture Notes - Lecture 15: Harm Reduction, Mass Incarceration, Insite
26 Nov 2013
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Document Summary
To provide an overview of the concept of the medico-legal borderland and its application to sociological research on harm reduction. To provide an orientation to the key principles and functions of public health. To provide an overview of harm reduction philosophy and services, focusing on illicit drug use. Introduced by timmermans and gabe to encourage sociologists and criminologists to consider the ways that health and health care intersect with crime and criminal law practices. Borders as divisions, sites of crossing, sites of conflict, as artificially constructed, as blurred. Medico-legal borderland and new forms of social control, new medico-legal identities, hybrid health- crime subjects. Competition between criminal justice system and public health system over defining and responding to complex social behaviours e. g. sex work, drug use, hiv non-disclosure. Public health vs. publicly funded health care. Public health focuses on improving and protecting health of communities through preventative rather than curative means.
