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Unit 2 - Global health governance and Big Pharma in the age of crisis

Site: Interdisciplinary Hub Education Network
Course: Political Economy of Antimicrobial Resistance and Infectious Diseases (2)
Book: Unit 2 - Global health governance and Big Pharma in the age of crisis
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Date: Friday, 19 April 2024, 6:13 PM

Table of contents

Unit Introduction

Unit Title: 

Unit 2 - Global health governance and Big Pharma in the age of crisis

This unit was delivered by Dr. Feyzi Ismail, SOAS

Unit Description

This lecture analyses how global governance institutions and states shape the pharmaceutical industry in ways that ultimately undermine solutions to AMR, including access to the Covid-19 vaccine, particularly in LMICs. It considers two broad approaches to global health governance in the context of AMR and Covid-19 – and attendant multiple crises – and explores the inequalities inherent in global governance dominated by the ideology of capitalist economic growth. The historical role of global governance is particularly important to understand in the context of ensuring that any vaccine that is developed in response to Covid-19 is accessible to all, regardless of ability to pay. We contend that market interference, promoted by the IFIs, distorts progress on poverty and inequality, positive global health outcomes and addressing the climate crisis, and reflects the imperialist dimensions of global governance institutions towards LMICs and the poor in general.  

Learning Objectives

By the end of the lecture the students will be able to:

  1. Draw connections between the historical and contemporary role of global governance institutions in LMICs and related imperialist dimensions.
  2. Understand the power and limits of the pharmaceutical industry in meeting global health outcomes and the role of the state.
  3. Analyse global governance, Big Pharma and the climate crisis in the context of the current pandemic.

Lecture slides

Slides will be uploaded 1-2 days before the live lecture on 22nd February 2021.

Please click HERE (link) to access the slides for this week.

Core Reading List


  1. Banerjee, D. (2017) Markets and Molecules: A Pharmaceutical Primer from the South. Medical Anthropology, 36(4): 363-380. Available at: https://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/104645 (link)
  2. McMahon, A. (2020) Global equitable access to vaccines, medicines and diagnostics for COVID-19: The role of patents as private governance. Journal of Medical Ethics, 1-7. Available at: https://jme.bmj.com/content/early/2020/11/29/medethics-2020-106795 (link)
  3. Sell, S.K. and Williams, O.D. (2020) Health under capitalism: a global political economy of structural pathogenesis. Review of International Political Economy, 27(1): 1-25. Available at: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09692290.2019.1659842 (link)

Additional readings


  1. Benvenisti, E. (2020) The WHO – Destined to fail? Political cooperation and the Covid-19 pandemic. The American Society of International Law, 114(4): 588-597.
  2. Boffey, D. (2020) Exclusive: big pharma rejected EU plan to fast-track vaccines in 2017. The Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/25/exclusive-big-pharma-rejected-eu-plan-to-fast-track-vaccines-in-2017 (link)
  3. Bollyky, T.J. and Brown, C.P. (2020) The Tragedy of Vaccine Nationalism. Only Cooperation Can End the Pandemic. Foreign Affairs, September/October 2020. Available at: https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2020-07-27/vaccine-nationalism-pandemic (link)
  4. Callaway, E. (2020) The unequal scramble for coronavirus vaccines - by the numbers. Nature 584(7822): 506-507. Available at: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02450-x (link)
  5. Dunford, M. and Qi, B. (2020) Global reset: COVID-19, systemic rivalry and the global order. Research in Globalization, 2: 1-12. Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/343474595_Global_reset_COVID-19_systemic_rivalry_and_the_global_order (link)
  6. Elbe, S., Roemer-Mahler, A. and Long, C. (2015) Medical countermeasures for national security: A new government role in the pharmaceuticalization of society. Social Science & Medicine, 131: 263-271. Available at: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277953614002664?via%3Dihub (link)
  7. Kremer, M. (2002) Pharmaceuticals and the developing world. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 16(4): 67-90. Available at: https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/089533002320950984 (link)

  8. Mazzucato, M., Li, H.L. and Darzi, A. (2020) Is it time to nationalise the pharmaceutical industry? British Medical Journal, 769. Available at: https://heatinformatics.com/sites/default/files/images-videosFileContent/bmj.m769.full_.pdf (link)

  9. Roemer-Mahler, A. (2014) The rise of companies from emerging markets in global health governance: Opportunities and challenges. Review of International Studies, (2014), 40: 897–918. Available at: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/review-of-international-studies/article/rise-of-companies-from-emerging-markets-in-global-health-governance-opportunities-and-challenges/D3E562B5E7196322AB329709499B3E56# (link)

  10. Wallace, R., Liebman, A. Chaves, L. F. and Wallace, R. (2020) COVID-19 and Circuits of Capital: New York to China and Back, Monthly Review, 1-15. https://monthlyreview.org/2020/05/01/covid-19-and-circuits-of-capital/ (link)


Additional materials


  1. https://www.gavi.org/vaccineswork/gavi-covax-amc-explained (link)


  1. Podcast: Politics Theory Other with Andreas Malm on Corona, climate, chronic emergency. Available at: https://soundcloud.com/poltheoryother/91-corona-climate-chronic-emergency-w-andreas-malm (link)

  1. Video: Decolonizing Pandemic Politics.