Overview

Critics of narcology-as addiction medicine is called in Russia-decry it as being ""backward,"" hopelessly behind contemporary global medical practices in relation to addiction and substance abuse, and assume that its practitioners lack both professionalism and expertise. On the basis of his research in a range of clinical institutions managing substance abuse in St. Petersburg, Eugene Raikhel increasingly came to understand that these assumptions and critiques obscured more than they revealed. Governing Habits is an ethnography of extraordinary sensitivity and awareness that shows how therapeutic practice and expertise is expressed in the highly specific, yet rapidly transforming milieu of hospitals, clinics, and rehabilitation centers in post--Soviet Russia. Rather than interpreting narcology as a Soviet survival or a local clinical world on the wane in the face of globalizing evidence-based medicine, Raikhel examines the transformation of the medical management of alcoholism in Russia over the past twenty years. Raikhel's book is more than a story about the treatment of alcoholism. It is also a gripping analysis of the many cultural, institutional, political, and social transformations taking place in the post--Soviet world, particularly in Putin's Russia. Governing Habits will appeal to a wide range of readers, from medical anthropologists, clinicians, to scholars of post-Soviet Russia, to students of institutions and organizational change, to those interested in therapies and treatments of substance abuse, addiction, and alcoholism.

Full Product Details

9781501703126

Table of Contents

Reviews

With vivid portrayals of how clinicians harness broad social forces in the quest for patient sobriety, Governing Habits engages foundational questions at the unruly nexus of clinical authority and legitimate care. The story of the social crafting of medical efficacy now has a new, groundbreaking account. -Adriana Petryna, author of Life Exposed: Biological Citizens after Chernobyl This brave book presents new material and interpretation of the treatment of alcoholism and drug addiction in post-Soviet Russia. Governing Habits will set the stage for new conversations about the cultural specificity of medicine and biomedicalization, as well as concepts of alcoholism and addiction that begin to open new avenues for thinking beyond the currently dominant paradigm of brain-based disorder. This is the best that medical anthropology can provide-a deeply historicized and richly contextualized account of the meaning, value, and significance of present practice. -Nancy D. Campbell, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, coauthor of Gendering Addiction: The Politics of Drug Treatment in a Neurochemical World Calling narcology a 'domain of knowledge, ethics, and intervention,' Eugene Raikhel raises a series of fascinating and significant questions regarding the place of truth and ethics, responsibility, personal autonomy, beneficence, and obligation in the processes that compose this domain. -Michele Rivkin-Fish, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, author of Women's Health in Post-Soviet Russia: the Politics of Intervention

""With vivid portrayals of how clinicians harness broad social forces in the quest for patient sobriety, Governing Habits engages foundational questions at the unruly nexus of clinical authority and legitimate care. The story of the social crafting of medical efficacy now has a new, groundbreaking account.""-Adriana Petryna, author of Life Exposed: Biological Citizens after Chernobyl ""This brave book presents new material and interpretation of the treatment of alcoholism and drug addiction in post-Soviet Russia. Governing Habits will set the stage for new conversations about the cultural specificity of medicine and biomedicalization, as well as concepts of alcoholism and addiction that begin to open new avenues for thinking beyond the currently dominant paradigm of brain-based disorder. This is the best that medical anthropology can provide-a deeply historicized and richly contextualized account of the meaning, value, and significance of present practice.""-Nancy D. Campbell, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, coauthor of Gendering Addiction: The Politics of Drug Treatment in a Neurochemical World ""Calling narcology a 'domain of knowledge, ethics, and intervention,' Eugene Raikhel raises a series of fascinating and significant questions regarding the place of truth and ethics, responsibility, personal autonomy, beneficence, and obligation in the processes that compose this domain.""-Michele Rivkin-Fish, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, author of Women's Health in Post-Soviet Russia: the Politics of Intervention

"""With vivid portrayals of how clinicians harness broad social forces in the quest for patient sobriety, Governing Habits engages foundational questions at the unruly nexus of clinical authority and legitimate care. The story of the social crafting of medical efficacy now has a new, groundbreaking account.""-Adriana Petryna, author of Life Exposed: Biological Citizens after Chernobyl ""This brave book presents new material and interpretation of the treatment of alcoholism and drug addiction in post-Soviet Russia. Governing Habits will set the stage for new conversations about the cultural specificity of medicine and biomedicalization, as well as concepts of alcoholism and addiction that begin to open new avenues for thinking beyond the currently dominant paradigm of brain-based disorder. This is the best that medical anthropology can provide-a deeply historicized and richly contextualized account of the meaning, value, and significance of present practice.""-Nancy D. Campbell, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, coauthor of Gendering Addiction: The Politics of Drug Treatment in a Neurochemical World ""Calling narcology a 'domain of knowledge, ethics, and intervention,' Eugene Raikhel raises a series of fascinating and significant questions regarding the place of truth and ethics, responsibility, personal autonomy, beneficence, and obligation in the processes that compose this domain.""-Michele Rivkin-Fish, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, author of Women's Health in Post-Soviet Russia: the Politics of Intervention"

Author Information

Eugene Raikhel is Assistant Professor in the Department of Comparative Human Development at the University of Chicago. He is coeditor of Addiction Trajectories as well as founder and editor of Somatosphere, an online forum for medical anthropology.

Tab Content 6

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

Countries Available