In Public Health Systems in the Age of Financialization, Ana Carolina Cordilha unpacks policy shifts that have transformed public health systems into vehicles for financial speculation and capital accumulation. While it is commonly thought that these systems are being cut back in the period of financialization, the author shows that current changes in public health financing go far beyond budget cuts and privatization measures. She examines how public health systems are adopting financial instruments and participating in financial accumulation strategies, with harmful impacts on transparency, democratic accountability, and health service provision. With an in-depth study of both the French and Brazilian systems, Cordilha explores the different ways in which this process unfolds in central and peripheral countries.

The health systems we enjoy today, and expected medical advances in the future, will be difficult to finance from public resources without major reforms. Public health spending in OECD countries has grown rapidly over most of the last half century. These spending increases have contributed to ...

This comprehensive and stimulating Handbook examines the contribution of political economy to public policy. It provides an overview of several strands of critical political economy, supported by case studies from OECD countries, Latin America, South Africa, and South and East Asia.

Economic shocks pose a threat to health and health system performance by increasing people's need for health care and making access to care more difficult - a situation compounded by cuts in public spending on health and other social services. But these negative effects can be avoided by timely public policy action. While important public policy levers lie outside the health sector, in the hands of those responsible for fiscal policy and social protection, the health system response is critical. This book looks at how health systems in Europe reacted to pressure created by the financial and economic crisis that began in 2008. Drawing on the experience of over 45 countries, the authors:' analyse health system responses to the crisis in three policy areas: public funding for the health system; health coverage; and health service planning, purchasing and delivery 'assess the impact of these responses on health systems and population health' identify policies most likely to sustain the performance of health systems facing financial pressure' explore the political economy of implementing reforms in a crisisThe book is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the choices available to policy-makers - and the implications of failing to protect health and health-system performance - in the face of economic and other forms of shock.--

Using a variety of theoretical frameworks drawn from the social sciences, the contributions in this edited collection offer a critical perspective on the dominant paradigms used in contemporary financial activities. Through a detailed study of the organisation and functioning of financial intermediaries and institutions, the contributors to this volume analyse ‘finance in the making’, by shedding light on the structuring of banking and financial systems, on their capacity to prescribe action and control, on their modes of regulation and, more generally, on the process of financialisation. Contributions presented in this volume have been written by authors working within the ‘social studies of finance’ tradition, a research programme that emerged twenty years ago, with the aim of addressing a diversity of financial fieldworks and related theoretical questions. This book, therefore, sheds light on different areas that are representative of contemporary financial realities. Specifically, it first studies the work of financial employees: traders, salespeople, investment managers, financial analysts, investment consultants, etc. but also provides an analysis of a range of financial instruments: financial schemes and contracts, financial derivatives, socially responsible investment funds, as well as market rules and regulations. Finally, it puts into perspective the organisations contributing to this financial reality: those developing and selling financial services (retail banks, brokerage houses, asset management firms, private equity firms, etc.), and also those contributing to the regulation of such activities (banking regulators, financial market authorities, credit rating agencies, the State, to name a few). Each text can be read without any specific knowledge of finance; the book is thus addressed to anyone willing to better understand the intricacies of contemporary financial realities.

Why healthcare finance? -- From the laboratory to the patient -- Present value relations -- Evaluating business opportunities -- Valuing bonds -- Valuing stocks -- Portfolio management and the cost of capital -- Therapeutic development and clinical trials -- Decision trees and real options -- Monte Carlo simulation -- Healthcare analytics -- Biotech venture capital -- Securitizing biomedical assets -- Pricing, value, and ethics -- Epilogue : a case study pf royalty pharma.