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The Politics of Health Care Reform

Lessons from the Past, Prospects for the Future

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Pages: 564

Published: June 1994

Editors: Gary S. Belkin, James A. Morone

Contributors: Lawrence D. Brown, Robert G. Evans, William A. Glaser, Colleen M. Grogan, Robert B. Hackey, Lawrence R. Jacobs, Nancy S. Jecker, Taeku Lee, David McBride, Theodore R. Marmor, Cathie Jo Martin, James A. Morone, Mark A. Peterson, David A. Rochefort, Rand E. Rosenblatt, David J. Rothman, Joan E. Ruttenberg, Mark Schlesinger, Theda Skocpol, Michael S. Sparer, Deborah Stone, Kenneth E. Thorpe, Joan Lehman

This distinguished collection stands out from the recent flurry of books on health reform by its sustained and sophisticated analysis of the political dimension. In The Politics of Health Care Reform, some of America’s best-known political scientists, historians, and legal scholars make sense of our most turbulent policy issue. They dig below the jargon and minutiae to explore the enduring questions of American politics, government reform, and health care.
The Politics of Health Care Reform explains how successful reforms occur in the United States and shows what is unique about health care issues. Theoretically informed, politically astute, historically nuanced, this volume takes an inventory of our health policy infrastructure. Here is an account of the institutions, ideas, and interests that shape health policy in the 1990s: Congress, the federal courts, interest groups, state governments, the public bureaucracy, business (large and small), the insurance industry, the medical profession. The volume offers a fresh look at such critical matters as public opinion, the politics of race and gender, and the lessons we can draw from other nations.
The Politics of Health Care Reform is the definitive collection of political science essays about health care. Expanded from two special issues of the Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law, the most prominent scholarly journal in the field it helped create, this collection will enliven the present debate over health reform and instruct everyone who is concerned about the future of American health care.

Contributors. Lawrence Brown, Robert Evans, William Glaser, Colleen Grogan, Robert Hackey, Lawrence Jacobs, Nancy Jecker, Taeku Lee, Joan Lehman, David McBride, Ted Marmor, Cathie Jo Martin, James A. Morone, Mark Peterson, David Rochefort, Rand Rosenblatt, David Rothman, Joan Ruttenberg, Mark Schlesinger, Theda Skocpol, Michael Sparer, Deborah Stone, Kenneth Thorpe

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Author/Editor Bios Table Of Contents Rights Additional Information

Author/Editor Bios

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James A. Morone is Professor of Political Science at Brown University and Editor of the Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law.

Gary S. Belkin, a Physician at Massachusetts General, completing a residency in psychiatry, is Associate Editor of the Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law.

Table Of Contents

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Introduction/ James A. Morone 1

A Century of Failure: Class Barriers to Reform/ David J. Rothman 11

The Struggle for the Soul of Health Insurance/ Deborah A. Stone 26

Is the Time Finally Ripe? Health Insurance Reforms in the 1990s/ Theda Skocpol 57

Black America: From Community Health Care to Crisis Medicine/ David McBride 77

From Community Health Care to Crisis Medicine: Have We Learned the Right Lessons?/ Joan M. Leiman 96

Congress in the 1990s: From Iron Triangles to Policy Networks/ Markr A. Peterson 103

The Bureaucracy Empowered/ James A. Monroe 148

The Courts and the Reconstruction of American Social Legislation/ Rand E. Rosesnblatt 165

Dogmatic Slumbers: American Business and Health Policy/ Lawrence D. Brown 205

Together Again: Business, Government, and the Quest for Cost Control/ Cathie Jo Martin 224

Can an Employer-Based Health Insurance System be Just?/ Nancy S. Jecker 259

Revisiting the Employment-Insurance Link/ Joan E. Ruttenberg 276

The Pragmatic Appeal of Employment-Based Health Care Reform/ David A. Rochefort 283

Is Health Care Different? Popular Support of Federal Health and Social Policies/ Mark Schlesinger and Taeku Lee 297

The Politics of American Ambivalence toward Government/ Lawrence R. Jacobs 375

American States and Canadian Provinces: A Comparative Analysis of Health Care Spending/ Kenneth E. Thorpe 405

Regulatory Regimes and State Health Policy/ Robert B. Hackey 418

The Unknown States/ Michael S. Sparer 430

Who Gets What? Levels of Care in Canada, Britain, Germany, and the United States/ Colleen M. Grogan 443

Canada: The Real Issues/ Robert G. Evans 463

Lessons from the Frozen North/ Theodore R. Marmor 487

Universal Health Insurance That Really Works: Foreign Lessons for the United States/ William A. Glaser 495

Index 523

Notes on Contributors 553

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Paper ISBN: 978-0-8223-1489-9 / Hardcover ISBN: 978-0-8223-1461-5 / eISBN: 978-0-8223-9860-8 /

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