SAP sponsored event: Fairness and Freedom in Public Health Policy

Restrictive public health policies limit individual freedoms in the pursuit of collective health goods. According to a widely endorsed principle of “least restrictive alternative”, only the lowest level of restrictiveness necessary to achieve a public health goal is justified. However, the same restrictions affect different people differently, and the same good benefits different people differently. Arguably, what matters is not only how restrictive a policy is, but also whose freedom is restricted and why.

Across times and places, restrictive policies have often pursued collective goods at the cost of unfairly distributing restrictions. While the problem is not new, it has been brought to the fore during the recent pandemic and will likely emerge as a key challenge in future public health policies. The conference will analyse from a multidisciplinary, Humanities-focused perspective the issue of fairness in the distribution of freedom restrictions in public health policy, bringing together experts from Philosophy, History, Public Policy, Politics, Anthropology, and the Social Sciences.

Convenor:

Alberto Giubilini

Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics, Faculty of Philosophy

Wellcome Centre for Ethics and Humanities

University of Oxford

With the support of:

Oxford Medical Humanities, University of Oxford

Wellcome Centre for Ethics and Humanities, University of Oxford 

John Fell Fund

Society for Applied Philosophy

Speakers:

Sorin Baiasu (Keele University), Philosophy

Kevin Bardosh (University of Washington), Medical Anthropology

Seung-Hoon Chae (University of Oxford), Politics

Hohee Cho (University of Oxford), History

Erica Charters (University of Oxford), History

Samuel Director (University of Florida Atlantic), Philosophy

Maja Graso (University of Groningen), Social Sciences

Mark Harrison (University of Oxford), History

Peter Horby (University of Oxford), Global Health

Michael Parker (University of Oxford), Bioethics

Anna Petherik (University of Oxford), Policy

Sadie Regmi (University of Oxford), Bioethics

Lucie White (Utrecht University), Philosophy

Bridget Williams (University of Oxford), Philosophy