Interrogating globalization, health and development: Towards a
comprehensive framework for research, policy and political action
RONALD LABONTE1 & RENEE TORGERSON2
1University of Ottawa, Canada and 2University of Saskatchewan, Canada

Abstract
Health researchers recognize the need to better understand the ways in which contemporary globalization
can lead to improved health for all, especially for the poor. This requires expanding the
global health research agenda beyond a disease-specific focus to one that also examines the social,
environmental and economic contexts that partly determine the incidence and persistence of many
diseases, and to understand how these contexts shape health opportunities and behaviours at different
levels. Organizing extant findings for policy purposes and to generate new studies capable of embodying
such complexity is rendered more feasible if guided by reasonably comprehensive frameworks
identifying the differing levels and pathways by which globalization phenomena can influence
health. This article presents such a framework, illustrating it with evidence of health effects of
globalization presently known though often disputed. Its value lies in its ability to shape future
research allowing detailed and rigorous study of certain of the relationships it maps to be located
within a broader research-informed policy context.

Correspondence: Professor Ron Labonte, Canada Research Chair, Globalization/Health Equity,
Institute of Population Health, University of Ottawa, 1 Stewart Street, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, K1N 6N5.

E-mail: [log in to unmask]

ISSN 0958-1596 print/ISSN 1469-3682 online 
 2005 Taylor & Francis Group Ltd
DOI: 10.1080/09581590500186117
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