Article Summary by Katharina Kieslich, Amelia Fiske, Marie Gaille, Ilaria Galasso, Susi Geiger, Nora Hangel, Ruth Horn, Marjolein Lanzing, Sébastien Libert, Elisa Lievevrouw, Federica Lucivero, Luca Marelli, Barbara Prainsack, Franziska Schönweitz, Tamar Sharon, Wanda Spahl, Ine Van Hoyweghen and Bettina M. Zimmermann

Solidarity is a term that many people are familiar with, but most would probably struggle to define what it means in practice. During the Covid-19 pandemic, politicians and public health experts called for people to show solidarity, for example by staying at home or by wearing masks to protect others. But what shape did solidarity take beyond these appeals, in the every-day lives of people? We interviewed over 600 residents in nine European countries to find out. The interviews took place in two different phases (April-May 2020 and October 2020) to understand how people’s thoughts and practices developed. In the beginning phases of the pandemic, people told us that they saw acts of solidarity all around, for example when local groups formed to take turns in going shopping for elderly and vulnerable individuals. As the pandemic went on, things started getting harder. Restrictions were slowly lifted, but people had to find a way to manage their old and new every-day routines in a challenging environment. People now expressed a longing for governments to do more to build and sustain solidarity in different societies. Solidarity was expressed through acts of support between individuals in the beginnings of the pandemic; in later phases, these acts were followed by calls for more government action to address social injustices and inequities. We argue that such calls provide important lessons for future health or other crises because they embody a longing for responsible and equitable governance in times of crises and beyond.

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Read the full article on the Medical Humanities journal website.

 

Katharina Kieslich is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Department of Political Science and the Centre for the Study of Contemporary Solidarity (CeSCoS) at the University of Vienna. She is the co-lead of the ‘Solidarity in Times of a Pandemic’ (SolPan) study. Her research focuses on health priority setting, solidarity in health care, and public participation in health policymaking.

Amelia Fiske is a Senior Research Fellow in the Institute for History and Ethics in Medicine at the Technical University of Munich. Her work is situated at the intersection of cultural anthropology, feminist science and technology studies, and environmental humanities.

Marie Gaille is a Senior Researcher in philosophy in the CNRS, affiliated with SPHERE research centre and Adjunct Scientific Director at the Institute for Social sciences and Humanities of the CNRS. Marie’s research focuses on the history and the meanings of the relationship between medicine, anthropology, and philosophy.

llaria Galasso is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Institute of History and Ethics in Medicine at the Technical University of Munich. Her research focuses on social justice and health equity (and the links between the two), with a particular interest in the social barriers to health and well-being in contexts of socioeconomic deprivation and migration, and the tensions between individual and social responsibility in health and beyond.

Susi Geiger is a Full Professor of Market Studies at UCD College of Business. Educated at the University of Mannheim, Germany, the Sorbonne Nouvelle, Paris, and Dublin City University, Susi’s work investigates the organisation and shaping of markets, with a particular focus on activist contestations against these markets. Her current research is focused on market failures and collaborative market innovation in healthcare markets.

Nora Hangel is PI of a philosophy of science project “JUKNOW” at the LCSS, University of Hannover. Previously she was a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Institute for History and Ethics in Medicine at the Technical University of Munich until 09/2022, where she worked on two projects: first, on the BMBF funded German and Swiss part of the SolPan Consortium; and second, she studied ethical or social aspects of Biomarkers in Atopic Dermatitis and Psoriasis (BIOMAP) within a Horizon-2020 Project.

Ruth Horn is an Associate Professor of Ethics at the Ethox Centre, University of Oxford and Deputy Director of the Institute of Ethics and History of Health in Society, University of Augsburg. Ruth works on ethical questions raised by medical practices and new technologies such as data-driven approaches to health in different socio-cultural contexts. Her research is at the intersection between sociology, bioethics and law/social policy.

Marjolein Lanzing is Assistant Professor Philosophy of Technology at the University of Amsterdam. Marjolein studies the ethical and political concerns related to new technologies, in particular concerns regarding privacy and surveillance (autonomy, discrimination, manipulation and commodification), and what they mean for the way we understand ourselves and our social relationships.

Sébastien Libert is an Honorary Researcher at University College London’s Division of Psychiatry. His work at the intersection of medical anthropology and ageing studies explores the role that current technologies, policies, and interventions for dementia play in social exclusion in later life.

Elisa Lievevrouw is a Researcher at the Life Sciences & Society Lab at the KU Leuven.

Federica Lucivero is a Senior Researcher in Ethics and Data at Ethox Centre, the Wellcome Centre for Ethics and Humanities and the department of Population Health. Her research focuses on the ethical aspects of the increasing introduction of digital, data-driven and AI technologies (online portals, wearable sensors, mobile apps) in care pathways, individual health practices, and biomedical research.

Luca Marelli is a Senior Research Fellow with the Life Sciences & Society Lab at the Centre for Sociological Research, KU Leuven. He also holds appointments as Adjunct Professor of Bio- ethics at the Department of Medical Biotechnology and Translational Medicine, University of Milan, and Visiting Research Fellow at the Department of Experimental Oncology, European Institute of Oncology IRCCS. His main research activities, at the intersection of Science & Technology Studies (STS), data governance and biomedical research policy, focus on the ethical, legal, and social aspects of data-intensive biomedicine and digital health. 

Barbara Prainsack is Professor of Comparative Policy Analysis at the University of Vienna, Austria, where she also directs the Research Platform Governance of Digital Practices. She is also chair of the European Group on Ethics (EGE) advising the European Commission.

Franziska Schönweitz is a student assistant at the Institute for History and Ethics in Medicine at the Technical University of Munich. She worked on the BMBF funded German part of the SolPan Consortium, supports the Biomarkers in Atopic Dermatitis and Psoriasis (BIOMAP) within a Horizon-2020 Project and the RR-AI Project (Tracing Ethical and Social Aspects of AI-Based Transformations in Healthcare Work and Knowledge Environments).

Tamar Sharon is Professor of Philosophy, Digitalisation and Society at Radboud University, where she co-directs iHub, an interdisciplinary research centre on digitalisation and society and chairs the department of ethics and political philosophy. She is a member of the European Group on Ethics (EGE) advising the European Commission.

Wanda Spahl is a Researcher at the Karl Landsteiner University of Health Sciences. Her research focuses health, migration and biopolitics. She is currently completing her doctoral thesis on her ethnographic research about refugees’ health needs in Austria.

Ine Van Hoyweghen is Full Professor of Sociology of Science, Technology & Medicine at KU Leuven where she directs the Life Sciences & Society Lab. Her work explores the social dimensions of biomedical science innovation in Europe, with current projects focusing on data-driven medicine.

Bettina Zimmermann is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Institute for History and Ethics of Medicine at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) and the Institute of Philosophy and Multidisciplinary Center of Infectious Diseases at the University of Bern (Switzerland). As an empirical bioethicist, her research focuses on ethical, legal, and social issues of genomics as well as infectious diseases, incorporating public media discourses and qualitative interview approaches.