The what is and why bother with a critical public health (06)

People who are in positions of power typically get to define the public health agenda.

But in reality, it is the people who are in positions of power who typically get to define the agenda in how to best protect and promote health. In critical public health we argue that we need to prioritize the perspectives of the publics more, especially those who have less institutional power.

And not just by highlighting how their experiences are interpreted through the lens of the researcher, but instead, to the best of our ability, how the experiences of the publics are interpreted by the publics themselves.

For the rest of the presentation, I’d like to discuss two of our ongoing projects that I hope will serve to illustrate what is a critical public health approach in practice, and why it’s important.