Towards Universal Health Care in Emerging Economies: Opportunities and Challenges

Organization(s): UNRISD
Author: Ana Luiza d’Ávila Viana, Ankita Gandhi, Armando de Negri Filho, Asep Suryahadi, Athia Yumna, Ben Fine, Elizabeth Koechlein, Erik Martinez Kuhonta, Hudson Pacífico da Silva, Ilcheong Yi, Julia Buxton, Kinglun Ngok, Linda J. Cook, Marcus André Melo, Mingqiang Li, Neha Kumra, Piya Hanvoravongchai, Prapaporn Tivayanond Mongkhonvanit, Rebecca Surender, Santosh Mehrotra, Shufang Zhang, Stein Ringen, Susanne MacGregor, Vita Febriany, William Hsiao
Country: Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, South Africa, Thailand, Venezuela
Year: 2017

This book explores how political, social, economic and institutional factors in eight emerging economies have combined to generate diverse outcomes in their move towards universal health care. Structured in three parts, the book begins by framing social policy as an integral system in its own right. The following two parts go on to discuss the opportunities and challenges of achieving universal health care in Thailand, Brazil and China, and survey the obstacles facing India, Indonesia, Russia, South Africa and Venezuela in the reform of their health care systems. The evolution of social policy systems and the cases in this volume together demonstrate that universalism in health care is continuously redefined by the interactions between diverse political forces and through specific policy processes. At a time when international and national-level discourse around health systems has once again brought universalism to the fore, this edited collection offers a timely contribution to the field in its thorough analysis of health care reform in emerging economies.

This book is available in hardcover or as an eBook.

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Universality of Protection

States parties to major human rights instruments related to economic, social and cultural rights such as the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) have an immediate minimum core obligation to ensure the satisfaction of, at the very least, minimum essential levels of all economic, social and cultural rights such as the right […]

Social Protection and Human Rights