Journal article
Avian influenza, ‘viral sovereignty’, and the politics of health security in Indonesia
The Pacific Review, Vol.27(3), pp.333-356
2014
Abstract
In December 2006, Indonesian Health Minister, Siti Fadilah Supari, shocked the world when announcing her government would no longer be sharing samples of the H5N1 avian flu virus, collected from Indonesian patients, with the World Health Organization, at a time when global fears of a deadly influenza pandemic were running high. For observers of Southeast Asian politics, the decision reinforced the view of the region as made up of states determined to protect their national sovereignty, at almost all costs. This established view of the region, however, generally neglects the variable and selective manner in which sovereignty has been invoked by Southeast Asian governments, or parts thereof, and fails to identify the conditions shaping the deployment of sovereignty. In this paper, it is argued that Siti's action was designed to harness claims of sovereignty to a domestic political struggle. It was a response to the growing fragmentation and, in some cases, denationalisation of the governance apparatus dealing with public health in Indonesia, along with the ‘securitisation’ of H5N1 internationally. The examination of the virus-sharing dispute demonstrates that in Southeast Asia sovereignty is not so much the ends of government action, but the means utilised by government actors for advancing particular political goals.
Details
- Title
- Avian influenza, ‘viral sovereignty’, and the politics of health security in Indonesia
- Authors/Creators
- S. Hameiri (Author/Creator)
- Publication Details
- The Pacific Review, Vol.27(3), pp.333-356
- Publisher
- Taylor and Francis
- Identifiers
- 991005544575607891
- Copyright
- Taylor and Francis
- Murdoch Affiliation
- Asia Research Centre
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Note
- Published online 24 April 2014
UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
This output has contributed to the advancement of the following goals:
Source: InCites
Metrics
637 File views/ downloads
170 Record Views
InCites Highlights
These are selected metrics from InCites Benchmarking & Analytics tool, related to this output
- Citation topics
- 1 Clinical & Life Sciences
- 1.228 Virology - Tropical Diseases
- 1.228.994 Viral Hemorrhagic Fevers
- Web Of Science research areas
- Area Studies
- International Relations
- ESI research areas
- Social Sciences, general