Global health, law and ethics: Fragmented sovereignty and the limits of universal theory

Abstract

The quotation that heads this chapter, taken from one of David Fidler’s manycontributions to debates on global health, captures the burden of my inquiry and the complexities that I wish to examine as a preliminary study of the roles and relationships of law and ethics in relation to global health. As Fidler makes clear, there is no difficulty in establishing that law is an important practical and normative tool in efforts to safeguard health (even whilst we should note that heated argument is inevitable on the legitimate bounds and basis of law’s role in so doing).² The difficult matter in global health is not establishing that law (and other formalized modes of governance) would have a role to play in optimizing good health outcomes, ensuring greater equity internationally, protecting against abuses of power, and so on. Rather, it is in finding the legal or quasi-legal mechanisms that might be employed to afford law a practical role to play. As Fidler makes clear, that question can only be answered given an inquiryin politics.³

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