Seminar ‘Increasing Health, Reducing Poverty - The Ethics of Global Institutional Reform’
With Thomas Pogge
May 18th, 9.00 a.m. - 1.00 p.m, Vredespaleis (Peace Palace), The Hague
The Health Impact Fund (HIF), initiated by Thomas Pogge, is an excellent example of the merger of theory and practice regarding what ought to be done to reduce poverty worldwide—specifically poverty related to inadequate health (care). The HIF proposes “a new way of stimulating research and development of life-saving pharmaceuticals and making them more accessible to the poor in developing countries” (www.healthimpactfund.org). Theoretical reflection about our ethical duties to the poor has resulted in a practical initiative that aims to ensure that people indeed act in line with those duties. Pogge’s solution is an example of what some have called ‘incentivizing ethics’. Inspired by, but in no way limited, to this case, this workshop seeks to explore both more abstract philosophical as well as applied ethical questions about (re)designing global institutions in order to bring about poverty reduction and justice.
Speaker Ville Päivän- salo: ”Perhaps the big- gest pharmaceutical cor- porations bring about the most impressive health impacts world-wide. Should politicians, then, channel further support to these corporations or, instead, to other forms of health promotion?”
After the opening talk by Thomas Pogge, a number of speakers will present their own ideas on the topic of the workshop (20 minutes each). See the blurbs on the right of this page to get an impression of the contents of their talk. Thomas Pogge will be invited to reply to their presentation (5 minutes), after which there is some time for questions and comments from other participants (5 minutes).
In addition to the speakers, there is room for maximum 15 participants in this seminar. There are still a few places available. If you are interested in participating, please send an e-mail to Ilse Oosterlaken ().
Speaker Paul Hunt: ”States have a human rights responsibility to provide international as- sistance and cooperation in health. Drawing upon my various UN reports and interventions, my talk will illustrate what this human rights responsibility means in practice.”
| 9.00-9.30 | Registration + coffee/tea |
| 9.30-9.35 | Opening by Jeroen van den Hoven, scientific director 3TU.Ethics |
| 9.35-10.00 | Opening talk by Thomas Pogge |
| 10.00-10.30 | Presentation by Ville Päivänsalo |
| (”Increasing Health and Fairness: | |
| Should We Worry about Monopolies?”) | |
| 10.30–11.00 | Presentation by David Koepsell |
| (”The HIF - Does It Ignore Root Injustices?”) | |
| 11:30-12:00 | Presentation by Paul Hunt |
| (”The Human Rights Responsibility of International | |
| Assistance and Cooperation in Health”) | |
| 12.00-1.00 | Discussion: |
| A research & action agenda for global institutional reform? | |
| 1.00-2.00 | Lunch |
Speaker David Koep- sell: ”Is it folly to try to patch up a system based upon faulty premises, such as that there are valid rights to intellectual property? Where unethi- cal monopolies are responsible for unaffor- dable health care, then why not eliminate the monopoly in the first place?”
This seminar is organized by:
