Health and policy in the welfare state

About this programme

This course introduces welfare research and adopts a historical and comparative perspective based on different countries and different welfare models. It addresses how the welfare state’s institutional characteristics and programmes can affect stratification processes and health – for example by policies that may affect the social determinants of health such as impact on gender differences, redistribution of resources, and poverty risks. The course further covers neoliberal influences on public health and welfare policies, and some of its consequences, since the 1990s such as: marketisation of health and welfare systems through privatisation and de-regulation, shifts towards conditioning and activation policies, governance, individualisation of health, and responsibilisation. This course is given both as a single subject course, and on the societal track of the master's programme, term 3. For more information on the programme: Master's programme in public health sciences: societal and individual perspectives Participation in the seminars is mandatory. In case of absence, the student will be given a compensatory assignment. More information will be published in the learning platform Canvas at the course starts. Please also see the course plan. The course is examined through an individually written take-home exam, and an individual written assignment that is orally presented at an examination seminar. This work also includes commenting upon another student’s individual assignment at an examination seminar, as well as active participation in the discussion during these e