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Social medicine was one of the key health paradigms of the early twentieth century. It perceived public health as a function of social conditions and aimed at improving it through comprehensive, horizontal strategies. Yet, it was no homogeneous or static phenomenon. Depending on time, place and circumstances, it took different, sometimes ideologically contradictory forms. This volume portrays leading medical experts from seven European countries. Their juxtaposition reveals a network of international interaction and shows how different people coped with the crises of the time in different ways, sometimes as part of the scientific mainstream, sometimes as opposition under attack, sometimes in exile. Their biographies reflect an ambivalent interplay of biomedicine, politics and social theory.

Of Medicine and Men: Biographies and Ideas in European Social Medicine between the World Wars

Contents : Iris Borowy: Introduction - Socrates Litsios: Selskar 'Mike' Gunn and Public Health Reform in Europe - Erik Ingebrigtsen: Béla Johan (1889-1983) and Public Health in Inter-war Hungary - Zeljko Dugac: Andrija Stampar (1888-1958): Resolute Fighter for Health and Social Justice - Zoe Sprigings: Melville Mackenzie (1889-1972). 'Feed the people and prevent disease, and be damned to their politics.' - Anne Hardy: Actions not Words. Thorvald Madsen, Denmark, and International Health. 1902-1939 - Iris Borowy: In the Shadow of Grotjahn. German Social Hygienists in the International Health Scene - Esteban Rodríguez-Ocana/Iris Borowy: Gustavo Pittaluga (1876-1956). Science as a Weapon for Social Reform in a Time of Crisis - Patrick Zylberman: A Posthumous Audit. Medical Biography and the Social History of Medicine.