38 Against the organization of misery? The Marmot Review of Health Inequalities
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Daniel Dorling
Abstract
In February 2010, the UK Government published Fair Society, Healthy Lives: Strategic Review of Health Inequalities in England Post-2010, better known as “The Marmot Review” after its lead author Professor Sir Michael Marmot. The very first words of the report are a variation on a quotation from Pablo Neruda:
“Rise up with me against the organisation of misery” Marmot et al, 2010, p 2
Pablo Neruda was a Chilean writer, a left-wing politician, and a confidant of president Salvador Allende; he died within days of August Pinochet’s coup. An official British document that begins with a quotation from a revolutionary communist would seem to promise unusually radical content.
The Marmot Review (2010) received extensive coverage and acclaim from London’s Guardian newspaper and was covered, albeit more briefly, in the Times and the Daily Telegraph, but few of the initial commentators seemed to believe that any of its main recommendations would actually be implemented. These included improving prenatal and early years provision, better drug addiction treatment, and raising social security payments. Rather than anticipating real progress in tackling health inequalities in the wake of the financial crash, one journalist suggested that:
“This grim situation makes those few Marmot recommendations that need not involve great public expense, such as better workplace procedures to deal with stress at work, all the more important, and every one should now get behind these.”(Guardian, 2010, March 15, p 30)
If all that can be done to reduce Britain’s grievous and persistent inequalities in health is to try to abate stress in the workplace, what does that say about the commitment of the British (government, academics, public health professionals, and public alike) to truly creating a fairer and healthier society?
The Marmot Review (2010) followed an earlier report also led by Sir Michael.
Abstract
In February 2010, the UK Government published Fair Society, Healthy Lives: Strategic Review of Health Inequalities in England Post-2010, better known as “The Marmot Review” after its lead author Professor Sir Michael Marmot. The very first words of the report are a variation on a quotation from Pablo Neruda:
“Rise up with me against the organisation of misery” Marmot et al, 2010, p 2
Pablo Neruda was a Chilean writer, a left-wing politician, and a confidant of president Salvador Allende; he died within days of August Pinochet’s coup. An official British document that begins with a quotation from a revolutionary communist would seem to promise unusually radical content.
The Marmot Review (2010) received extensive coverage and acclaim from London’s Guardian newspaper and was covered, albeit more briefly, in the Times and the Daily Telegraph, but few of the initial commentators seemed to believe that any of its main recommendations would actually be implemented. These included improving prenatal and early years provision, better drug addiction treatment, and raising social security payments. Rather than anticipating real progress in tackling health inequalities in the wake of the financial crash, one journalist suggested that:
“This grim situation makes those few Marmot recommendations that need not involve great public expense, such as better workplace procedures to deal with stress at work, all the more important, and every one should now get behind these.”(Guardian, 2010, March 15, p 30)
If all that can be done to reduce Britain’s grievous and persistent inequalities in health is to try to abate stress in the workplace, what does that say about the commitment of the British (government, academics, public health professionals, and public alike) to truly creating a fairer and healthier society?
The Marmot Review (2010) followed an earlier report also led by Sir Michael.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Front Matter i
- Contents v
- Sources of extracts vii
- Foreword xi
- Acknowledgements xiv
- Introduction 1
-
Inequality and poverty
- Prime suspect: murder in Britain 13
- The dream that turned pear-shaped 31
- The soul searching within New Labour 41
- Unequal Britain 49
- Axing the child poverty measure is wrong 57
-
Injustice and ideology
- Brutal budget to entrench inequality 63
- New Labour and inequality: Thatcherism continued? 65
- All in the mind? Why social inequalities persist 83
- Glass conflict: David Cameron’s claim to understand poverty 93
- Clearing the poor away 97
-
Race and identity
- Ghettos in the sky 103
- Worlds apart: how inequality breeds fear and prejudice in Britain 111
- How much evidence do you need? Ethnicity, harm and crime 115
- UK medical school admissions by ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and sex 121
- Race and the repercussions of recession 125
-
Education and hierarchy
- What’s it to do with the price of fish? 133
- Little progress towards a fairer education system 139
- One of Labour’s great successes 147
- Do three points make a trend? 149
- Educational mobility, England and Germany 155
- Cash and the not so classless society 159
- Britain must close the great pay divide 165
- Raising equality in access to higher education 170
-
Elitism and geneticism
- The Darwins and the Cecils are only empty vessels 189
- The Fabian essay: the myth of inherited inequality 193
- The return to elitism in education 199
- The super-rich are still soaring away 209
-
Mobility and employment
- The trouble with moving upmarket 217
- Britain – split and divided by inequality 221
- London and the English desert: the grain of truth in a stereotype 225
- Are the times changing back? 237
- Unemployment and health 243
-
Bricks and mortar
- Mortality amongst street sleeping youth in the UK 249
- Daylight robbery: there’s no shortage of housing 251
- The influence of selective migration patterns 255
- The geography of poverty, inequality and wealth in the UK and abroad 263
- All connected? Geographies of race, death, wealth, votes and births 291
-
Well-being and misery
- Against the organization of misery? The Marmot Review of Health Inequalities 299
- Inequality kills 307
- The geography of social inequality and health 311
- The cartographer’s mad project 327
- The fading of the dream: widening inequalities in life expectancy in America 333
- The importance of circumstance 339
-
Advocacy and action
- Mean machine: how structural inequality makes social inequality seem natural 347
- Policing the borders of crime: who decides research? 351
- Learning the hard way 357
- When the social divide deepens 363
- Ending the scandal of complacency 365
- Our grandchildren will wonder why we were addicted to social inequality 369
- Mind the gap: New Labour’s legacy on child poverty 373
- Remapping the world’s population: visualizing data using cartograms 379
- If I were king 385
- Bibliography 387
- Index 389
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Front Matter i
- Contents v
- Sources of extracts vii
- Foreword xi
- Acknowledgements xiv
- Introduction 1
-
Inequality and poverty
- Prime suspect: murder in Britain 13
- The dream that turned pear-shaped 31
- The soul searching within New Labour 41
- Unequal Britain 49
- Axing the child poverty measure is wrong 57
-
Injustice and ideology
- Brutal budget to entrench inequality 63
- New Labour and inequality: Thatcherism continued? 65
- All in the mind? Why social inequalities persist 83
- Glass conflict: David Cameron’s claim to understand poverty 93
- Clearing the poor away 97
-
Race and identity
- Ghettos in the sky 103
- Worlds apart: how inequality breeds fear and prejudice in Britain 111
- How much evidence do you need? Ethnicity, harm and crime 115
- UK medical school admissions by ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and sex 121
- Race and the repercussions of recession 125
-
Education and hierarchy
- What’s it to do with the price of fish? 133
- Little progress towards a fairer education system 139
- One of Labour’s great successes 147
- Do three points make a trend? 149
- Educational mobility, England and Germany 155
- Cash and the not so classless society 159
- Britain must close the great pay divide 165
- Raising equality in access to higher education 170
-
Elitism and geneticism
- The Darwins and the Cecils are only empty vessels 189
- The Fabian essay: the myth of inherited inequality 193
- The return to elitism in education 199
- The super-rich are still soaring away 209
-
Mobility and employment
- The trouble with moving upmarket 217
- Britain – split and divided by inequality 221
- London and the English desert: the grain of truth in a stereotype 225
- Are the times changing back? 237
- Unemployment and health 243
-
Bricks and mortar
- Mortality amongst street sleeping youth in the UK 249
- Daylight robbery: there’s no shortage of housing 251
- The influence of selective migration patterns 255
- The geography of poverty, inequality and wealth in the UK and abroad 263
- All connected? Geographies of race, death, wealth, votes and births 291
-
Well-being and misery
- Against the organization of misery? The Marmot Review of Health Inequalities 299
- Inequality kills 307
- The geography of social inequality and health 311
- The cartographer’s mad project 327
- The fading of the dream: widening inequalities in life expectancy in America 333
- The importance of circumstance 339
-
Advocacy and action
- Mean machine: how structural inequality makes social inequality seem natural 347
- Policing the borders of crime: who decides research? 351
- Learning the hard way 357
- When the social divide deepens 363
- Ending the scandal of complacency 365
- Our grandchildren will wonder why we were addicted to social inequality 369
- Mind the gap: New Labour’s legacy on child poverty 373
- Remapping the world’s population: visualizing data using cartograms 379
- If I were king 385
- Bibliography 387
- Index 389
