Main description:

In the burgeoning work on global health governance, the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development's (OECD) role as an influential think tank and transmission belt for health policy ideas remains unexplored. Global Health Governance and the OECD is a unique and in-depth study of the development of the OECD in relation to global health governance. It traces how the OECD's predecessor, the OEEC, commenced work in health in the 1950s; work that slowly grew over the years and was expanded by the OECD into a variety of health-related areas, in the last decade into the leading source of internationally comparative health statistics and performance measures. The book will assess the place of the OECD in the broader system of global health governance, examining its relations with bodies such as the WHO, UNICEF, the WTO and the Codex Alimentarius; as well as how the OECD acts at a fine-grained level as a 'network of networks' or a 'key node' by linking together national health authorities within the series of OECD health committees that guide the work of health officials.

Contents:

A Slowly Growing Role: From the Marshall Plan to the Oil crises of the 1970s: From the OEEC to the OECD: The Ad Hoc Development of Work on Health; The 1970s: Oil, public Expenditures, The Environment, Social Indicators and Health; A More Substantive Role: Comparing Health Expenditures and Policy in the 1980s and 1990s: International Health Governance in the 1980s and 1990s: An Overview; From Uncertainty to an OECD Health Strategy: The 1990s; Gaining a Place in the Nascent System of Global Health Governance: The Rapid Rise of Health on the OECD Agenda: Establishing a Significant Role for Health on the OECD's Agenda: The 2000s;; The EU, The OECD and Work on Health; Key Relationships and Networks in Global Health Governance: The OECD, WHO, UNICEF, WTO and the Codex Alimentarius; Government or Governance? The G7/8, the OECD and Global Health Governance.