politics and power in global health: the constituting role of conflicts; comment on “navigating between stealth advocacy and unconscious dogmatism: the challenge of researching the norms, politics and power of global health”

in a recent article, gorik ooms has drawn attention to the normative underpinnings of the politics of global health. we claim that ooms is indirectly submitting to a liberal conception of politics by framing the politics of global health as a question of individual morality. drawing on the theoretical works of chantal mouffe, we introduce a conflictual concept of the political as an alternative to ooms’ conception. using controversies surrounding medical treatment of aids patients in developing countries as a case we underline the opportunity for political changes, through political articulation of an issue, and collective mobilization based on such an articulation.