Call for papers: Managing National Healthcare: Economics, Culture, and Strategic Choice

A special issue of European Journal of International Management

Central to the recent global debate on national healthcare are issues concerning economics and cultural values that drive decisions affecting the scale, scope, and delivery of health services (both preventive and treatment) provided for a country’s population. While most agree on the goal of seeking quality healthcare at an affordable price, wide disagreement exists, both within and across nations, about who (government, individual, or third party) should pay for what service and whether national healthcare should operate as a business, public welfare programme, or a social enterprise. In the absence of clear evidence favouring one option over another, policymakers engage in “strategic choice” (Child, 1972), choosing between value-based priorities and criteria of operational effectiveness in making national healthcare decisions.

This special issue seeks to publish research that helps delineate the complex nature of national healthcare and offers evidence-based recommendations for its effective management. We are particularly interested in topics which include but are not limited to:

• studies that investigate fundamental tensions between economic concerns and cultural values surrounding national healthcare, and how these tensions can be resolved or managed through strategic choice
• submissions that seek to frame the debate in novel and creative ways with the aim of introducing innovations into the design and/or delivery of healthcare at different levels of operation (e.g., individual, organization, regional, country, and international).
• contributions that examine topics related to policies and practices concerning the development of new drugs, particularly those that combat rare and neglected diseases, given the important role played by pharmaceutical companies in the healthcare field

Authors interested in submitting to the Special Issue should send an abstract (maximum 3 double-spaced pages) to the guest editor at the address below summarizing the key ideas of their paper and how it helps advance fundamental knowledge about national health care and its effective management. EJIM publishes both conceptual and empirical works, with special interest in papers that develop interdisciplinary knowledge by integrating theoretical ideas and research methods from two or more disciplines.

Important Dates
Deadline for Abstract Submission: 1 November, 2010
Deadline for Abstract Review Notification: 15 December, 2010
Deadline for Full Paper Submission: 1 May, 2011