Men, health and medicalization

The concept of medicalization has been present within medical sociology for well over fifty years. However, discussion and debate relating this concept to critical studies of men and masculinities have been slower to emerge. Building on feminist inspired work, this chapter traces the historical roots of medicalization focusing on men and masculinities in order to explore agentic acts of compliance and resistance to medicalization processes. It further elucidates the intersectional nature these acts, and their links to wider processes of globalization and pharmacueticalization, by considering two specific cases: coronary heart disease; and HIV in Sub-Saharan Africa.