Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-5g6vh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-26T04:55:12.579Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

How the Social Determinants of Indigenous Health became Policy Reality for Australia's National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Plan

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 May 2018

MATTHEW FISHER Open the ORCID record for MATTHEW FISHER [Opens in a new window] ,
SAMANTHA BATTAMS ,
DENNIS MCDERMOTT ,
FRAN BAUM  and
COLIN MACDOUGALL
MATTHEW FISHER
Affiliation:
Southgate Institute for Health Society and Equity, Flinders University of South Australia, Sturt Rd, Bedford Park, South Australia 5042 Centre of Research Excellence in the Social Determinants of Health Equity, Flinders University of South Australia, Level 2, Room 2.06 Health Sciences Building, Registry Road, Bedford Park SA 5042 email: matt.fisher@flinders.edu.au
SAMANTHA BATTAMS
Affiliation:
Southgate Institute for Health Society and Equity, Flinders University of South Australia, Sturt Rd, Bedford Park, South Australia 5042 email: sam.battams@flinders.edu.au
DENNIS MCDERMOTT
Affiliation:
Centre of Research Excellence in the Social Determinants of Health Equity, Flinders University of South Australia, Level 2, Room 2.06 Health Sciences Building, Registry Road, Bedford Park SA 5042 The Poche Centre for Indigenous Health and Well-being, Flinders University of South Australia, Sturt Rd, Bedford Park, South Australia 5042 email: dennis.mcdermott@flinders.edu.au
FRAN BAUM
Affiliation:
Southgate Institute for Health Society and Equity, Flinders University of South Australia, Sturt Rd, Bedford Park, South Australia 5042 Centre of Research Excellence in the Social Determinants of Health Equity, Flinders University of South Australia, Level 2, Room 2.06 Health Sciences Building, Registry Road, Bedford Park SA 5042 email: fran.baum@flinders.edu.au
COLIN MACDOUGALL
Affiliation:
College of Medicine and Public Health, Flinders University of South Australia, Sturt Rd, Bedford Park, South Australia 5042 email: colin.macdougall@flinders.edu.au
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The paper analyses the policy process which enabled the successful adoption of Australia's National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Plan 2013–2023 (NATSIHP), which is grounded in an understanding of the Social Determinants of Indigenous Health (SDIH). Ten interviews were conducted with key policy actors directly involved in its development. The theories we used to analyse qualitative data were the Advocacy Coalition Framework, the Multiple Streams Approach, policy framing and critical constructionism. We used a complementary approach to policy analysis. The NATSIHP acknowledges the importance of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (hereafter, Aboriginal) culture and the health effects of racism, and explicitly adopts a human-rights-based approach. This was enabled by a coalition campaigning to ‘Close the Gap’ (CTG) in health status between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Australians. The CTG campaign, and key Aboriginal health networks associated with it, operated as an effective advocacy coalition, and policy entrepreneurs emerged to lead the policy agenda. Thus, Aboriginal health networks were able to successfully contest conventional problem conceptions and policy framings offered by government policy actors and drive a paradigm shift for Aboriginal health to place SDIH at the centre of the NATSIHP policy. Implications of this research for policy theory and for other policy environments are considered along with suggestions for future research.

Type
Article
Information
Journal of Social Policy , Volume 48 , Issue 1 , January 2019 , pp. 169 - 189
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Australian Government (2013), National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Plan 2013–2023, Canberra: Commonwealth of Australia.Google Scholar
Australian Government (2016), Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Performance Framework, Canberra: Commonwealth of Australia.Google Scholar
Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (2016), Australia's Health 2016. Canberra: Australian Government, AIHW.Google Scholar
Bacchi, C. (1999), Women, policy and politics: The construction of policy problems, London: Sage publications.Google Scholar
Battams, S., Roche, A., Duvnjak, A., Trifonoff, A. and Bywood, P. (2010), For Kids’ Sake: A workforce development resource for Family Sensitive Policy and Practice in the Alcohol and Other Drugs Sector, Adelaide: National Centre for Education and Training on Addiction, Flinders University.Google Scholar
Browne, J., de Leeuw, E., Gleeson, D., Adams, K., Atkinson, P. and Hayes, R. (2017), ‘A network approach to policy framing: A case study of the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Plan’, Social Science & Medicine, 172, 10–18.Google Scholar
Cairney, P. (2013), ‘Standing on the shoulders of giants: How do we combine the insights of multiple theories in public policy studies?’ Policy Studies Journal, 41: 2013, 1–21.Google Scholar
Carson, B., Dunbar, T., Chenhall, R. and Bailie, R. (Eds.) (2007), Social determinants of Indigenous Health, Crows Nest, NSW: Allen & Unwin.Google Scholar
Commission on the Social Determinants of Health (2008), Closing the gap in a generation: Health equity through action on the social determinants of health, Geneva: World Health Organization.Google Scholar
Donato, R. and Segal, L. (2013), ‘Does Australia have the appropriate health reform agenda to close the gap in Indigenous health?’ Australian Health Review, 37: 2, 232–238.Google Scholar
Fisher, M., Baum, F., MacDougall, C., Newman, L. and McDermott, D. (2015), ‘A qualitative methodological framework to assess uptake of evidence on social determinants of health in health policy’. Evidence & Policy: A Journal of Research, Debate and Practice, 11: 4, 491–507.Google Scholar
Fisher, M., Baum, F., MacDougall, C., Newman, L. and McDermott, D. (2016). ‘To what extent do Australian health policy documents address social determinants of health and health equity?’ Journal of Social Policy, 45: 3, 545–564.Google Scholar
Hill, M. (2009), The public policy process, New York: Longman.Google Scholar
Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner (2005), Social justice report 2005, Canberra: HREOC.Google Scholar
Kingdon, J. (2011), Agendas, Alternatives and Public Policies, New York: Addison-Wesley Educational Publishers.Google Scholar
Lewis, J.M. (2005), Health Policy and Politics: Networks, Ideas and Power, Melbourne: IP Communications.Google Scholar
Marmot, M., Allen, J., Bell, R., Bloomer, E. and Goldblatt, P. (2012), ‘WHO European review of social determinants of health and the health divide’, The Lancet, 380: 9846, 1011–1029.Google Scholar
NACCHO (2016), ‘Introduction - the need for NACCHO’, http://www.naccho.org.au/about-nacho/naccho-history/ (Accessed 16th October 2017).Google Scholar
National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Council (2003), National Strategic Framework for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health, Canberra: Commonwealth of Australia.Google Scholar
O'Donnell, K. and MacDougall, C. (2016) ‘Social determinants of health of Australia's First Peoples’, In Keleher, H. and McDougall, C. (Eds.) Understanding Health, Melbourne: Oxford University Press, pp. 176–196.Google Scholar
Office for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health (1989), A national Aboriginal health strategy, Canberra: Commonwealth of Australia.Google Scholar
Popay, J., Whitehead, M. and Hunter, D. (2010), ‘Injustice is killing people on a large scale—but what is to be done about it?’ Journal of Public Health, 32: 2, 148–149.Google Scholar
Pressman, J. and Widavsky, A. (1984), Implementation: How Great Expectations in Washington Are Dashed in Oakland, Berkeley, California: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Roche, A.M., Duraisingam, V., Trifonoff, A., Battams, S., Freeman, T., Tovell, A., Weetra, D. and Bates, N. (2013), ‘Sharing stories: Indigenous alcohol and other drug workers' well-being, stress and burnout.' Drug and Alcohol Review, 3: 5, 527–535.Google Scholar
Sabatier, P.A. and Jenkins-Smith, H. (1999). ‘The advocacy coalition framework’, in Sabatier, P.A. (Ed.), Theories of the policy process, Colorado, USA: Westview Press, pp. 117–166.Google Scholar
Sabatier, P.A. and Weible, C.M. (2007), ‘The advocacy coalition framework.' In Sabatier, P. A. (Ed.) Theories of the policy process, Colorado, USA: Westview Press. pp. 189–220.Google Scholar
United Nations General Assembly (2007), Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, New York: UN.Google Scholar
van Hulst, M. and Yanow, D. (2016),‘From policy “frames” to “framing”: Theorizing a more dynamic, political approach’, American Review of Public Administration, 46: 1, 92–112.Google Scholar
Zahariadis, N. (2007), ‘The multiple streams framework: Structure, limitations, prospects’, in Sabatier, P.A. (Ed.) Theories of the policy process, 2nd ed. Colorado, USA: Westview Press, pp. 65–92.Google Scholar