Paper short abstract:

The article is based on ethnography of the relationship between industrial pollution and cancer in Brindisi. I will propose a reflection on the practices and negotiation forms of cause-effect relationship between pollution and cancer within the local\global field of “public health”.

Paper long abstract:

Brindisi is a city in the South-east of Italy with high industrial density - two coal-fired power plants and a large petrochemical complex - and a high percentage of cancer deaths with an excess of a lung cancer. According to LILT - Italian League for Fighting Cancer - the number of deaths rose from 884 in 2006 to 960 in 2008 with data still on the rise. The pollution of coal power plants as well as that of petrochemical complex is considered as the main cause of diseases and deaths by the local doctors union and some social movements. However this report is constantly negotiated and redefined by the parties involved (energy companies, doctors, local social movements, politicians, researchers) in a very articulate public health field, that involves different local\global spheres of public, politic, professional and private life, in which power relations and high emotionally contrasts define the position of many social actors.

My paper is based on an ethnography started in 2009 and still in progress, focused on the relationship between pollution and disease in Brindisi. I will propose two lines of analysis strictly related. On one hand an ethnographic reflection on negotiation form and practices of categories and values as "right to health", "sick of coal", "public health", "medical authority" inside a cause-effect relationship between pollution and disease. On the other hand, I will try to reflect on the position of the ethnographer and the role of his own research within the conflictual field of public health policies.