Pandemics, People, and Economic Margins

Africa has, since the 1940s, been a recipient of foreign aid to fight a number of diseases. Funds provided by a variety of organizations have been channeled to contain diseases that are considered a threat to economic development and the general wellbeing of populations. Indeed, disease burdens – including malaria, diarrhea, tuberculosis, HIV-AIDS, Ebola, and the COVID-19 pandemic – have all attracted millions of dollars in funding. Existing scholarship has demonstrated that financial interventions are indicative of the economic and policy priorities of those who provide money. Indeed, various scholars have shown that from the time of colonial rule, government economic priorities determined what kind of investment and disease intervention occurred in public health. Scholars of sub-Saharan Africa have also explained how decisions that were taken by many governments in the 1980s and 1990s to defund healthcare reflected on the economic interests of powerful organizations such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Nowhere was this enduring tendency more evident than the ways in which the world responded to the outbreak of the Coronavirus disease in 2019. Many governments across the world recognized the outbreak of the disease as an adverse event with economic ramifications, both at national and local levels. Decisions to provide economic stimulus to various institutions have, once again, uncovered the extent to which official interests paid little attention to spheres of intimate life, particularly in families where the social and economic pressures of disease are primarily experienced.

It is without doubt that the outbreak of Covid-19 placed unprecedented pressure on healthcare systems, most of which were already financially strained. Medical institutions shifted attention and resources from pre-existing health conditions needing constant care, such as chronic illnesses like HIV and AIDS, hypertension, and diabetes. In addition, maternal and infant health was severely compromised. Pregnant women missed antenatal care, as did infants in meeting their immunization schedules. Even after the approval of vaccines, the lack of adequate safety data meant that pregnant and breastfeeding women were not initially prioritized to receive them, despite evidence that pregnant women faced higher risk of complications. Meanwhile, lockdowns enforced by security forces made hospitals less accessible to many. Fear of contracting the disease also prevented many others from seeking medical attention in official health institutions. When public finances were directed at authoritarian means intended to stop the spread of the virus and many lost their livelihoods, and food supply channels were cut, threats posed by food insecurity and other health conditions arose. In Africa, many people increasingly relied on indigenous and faith healing, for survival. Thus, despite being ignored by policy makers and scientists and researchers in various disciplines, on the ground, alternative health care practices played an important role in subsidizing public funded healthcare.

Economic crises generated by diseases are well-documented across Africa, but we know little about the ways in which alternative healthcare providers engage with those crises in their efforts to preserve people’s health and wellbeing. We are, therefore, proposing to convene a Bootcamp comprised of participants who can contribute on casting light on a blind spot in the histories of disease, health, and healing in economically marginal communities across Africa: the ways in which alternative healthcare practitioners who populate socio-economic margins subsidize public health in times of economic crises that are generated by epidemics and disease. We call upon scholars who are willing to come up with innovative methodologies that would result in producing intimate histories standing at the intersection of the political economy of healthcare, disease, and lived experiences in home and community settings. Scholars whose research cover a variety of issues from the period after the Second World War to contemporary issues related to the COVID-19 and other pressing issues in public health are particularly welcome.

The proposed Bootcamp – which is the second of its kind to be hosted by the International Studies Group – seeks to address two interconnected challenges faced by young scholars: intellectual networking and publishing. The Bootcamp will allow scholars to share ideas about effective methodological and conceptual approaches, critical thinking and writing skills necessary for publishing work around the broader issue of health and healing. The Bootcamp will also help scholars navigate the challenges of academic publishing. We will collaborate with the Southern Journal of Contemporary History based at the University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa. The Bootcamp organisers realize the difficulty of having the papers of young scholars published, which indeed is partly due to the state of the papers but mostly due to the marginalization of many scholars in the global south in high impact international journals. It is for this reason that we decided to partner with the Southern Journal of Contemporary History. The collaboration with the Southern Journal of Contemporary History will result in the publication of a Special Issue where the organisers of the Bootcamp will be the guest editors.

**Aims
i. Provide young scholars with a platform to refine and sharpen their writing skills for the purposes of academic publishing.
ii. Help young scholars publish their completed journal articles in a special issue in the Southern Journal of Contemporary History.
iii. Foster collaboration for the purposes of academic publishing between young scholars and senior academics.

Theme of the Bootcamp
The theme of the second Bootcamp titled, Pandemic, People, and Economic Margins, places knowledge, practices, and care resources provided by ordinary women and men at the centre of health and healing on the continent. Historians have paid little attention to the role played by alternative service providers in healthcare. The foundations of the study of alternative healthcare goes back to the 1980s, when scholarly attention sought to move away from studies that focused on institutions, traditions, and professionals who provide healthcare. This approach identified therapeutic and non-therapeutic caregiving provided by alternative practitioners as an aspect of healthcare which has received insufficient scholarly attention. The contributions to the Bootcamp and the subsequent special issue will enrich the contemporary debates around health and healing in Africa, setting into motion the production of an African analytical framework for the study of the topic in Africa, by scholars based on the continent. For this purpose, the organizers of the Bootcamp are accepting complete or semi-complete draft papers on, but not limited to, the following subjects, with a particular focus on pandemics in Africa:

1. Disease as a force of social and economic change
2. Donors, Public Health, and the costs of Maternal and Infant Health in Africa.
3. Indigenous midwifery and the costs of maternal health and childbirth in Africa.
4. Crises in medical professions, Families, and the care of the sick
5. Caring for the sick during economic crises in Africa.
6. Economic crises, Food and Nutritional Security, and the role of women.
7. Covid-19, Economic Struggles, and the Perils of Substance Abuse
8. Digital Money and Remittances as Health Insurance

Application Procedure and Deadline

Applicants are asked to submit Abstracts and BIOs not exceeding 500 and 100 words, respectively, by 30 June 2024,

via the following email address: pandemicsandeconomicmargins@gmail.com

For enquiries, please contact Dr Priscillah Machinga, email address:  primachinga@gmail.com

And Dr Joseph Jakarasi, email address:  drjosephjakarasi@gmail.com

We have available a few stipends covering travelling and accommodation costs and those wishing to apply for them should submit a letter of motivation supporting their application.

Successful Applicants will be notified by 30 July 2024.