Paper short abstract:

In this paper, I examine processes or fundamental elements that enable the constitution of a particular governmental problem in the context of global health, the problem of Antimicrobial Resistance in this case, as an emergency.

Paper long abstract:

My purpose in this chapter is not to examine or to make an epistemological claim regarding whether AMR should or should not be defined as a health emergency. Instead, it is to understand the dynamics that underlie the uncertain and indeterminate ontological status of AMR in this regard – at once an emergency, a “slow” emergency, and a non-emergency. By that, I do not mean that my focus is on different perceptions or ontologies of emergency per se, but instead on how the problem of AMR has been, at least to an extent, “emergencized”. In other words, I examine processes or fundamental elements that constitute a particular governmental problem in the context of global health, AMR in this case, as an emergency.

Based on my analysis, I identify three interlinked dimensions, processes, or key factors that enable the constitution of a problem as an emergency. First, a realization of the problem as, or a process whereby the problem becomes a general event that is situated, in historical terms, as a fracture (“crisis”). Second, an array of developments or a process in which loosely connected and scattered governmental interventions are gradually replaced by emerging and more stable networks that routinely and systematically manage the problem through governmental apparatuses. Third, a process through which the general event is compressed, and a constant maintenance of this compression. The general event is made concrete, immediate, and urgent through a combination of discourses and technologies that create a compression or cringe effect.