L'intégration organisationnelle de la participation : des enjeux locaux pour une santé publique globale

In an age of the institutional globalization of modern societies, the confluence of a myriad of micro- and macro-contextual factors complicates the international socio-political arena.  In this context, the integration of participatory values through the democratization processes of Public Health takes on the appearance of an organizational strategy promoting cohesion among a multitude of local and global initiatives. The constant renewal of intersectoral knowledge and the social perception of risk suggest an increased social awareness regarding the limits of technical competence of social and healthcare Systems.   As a legitimate international actor in the management of modern health risks, Public Health creates participatory spaces that enable interaction of intersectoral actors and constantly changing and dynamic knowledge. It is indeed a strategy of the institutional “relocalisation” of collective action, aiming to restore trust in the level of reliability of international Public Health representatives who only partially meet the current needs of population security.   In this context, Local Health Councils (LHC), implemented internationally as part of decentralized Primary Health Care (PHC) regional policies, represent participative spaces that involve countless paradoxical forces of tension. The LHC provides both an opportunity to examine the reciprocal relationship between an in-depth empirical analysis of specific participatory practices (PP), as well as a conceptual comprehension of the institutional globalization defining the general expansionist tendencies of modern societies.   Using the organizational transition model (OTM), we postulate that the integration of PP into LHC governance is potentially associated with organizational change in creating both the conditions and the consequences of numerous strategic and systemic translations, which are essentially transformative.  However, in order for this transformation to occur, relevant participative skills need to be developed.  Consequently, this participative phenomenon takes on the shape of an organizational learning process allowing new forms of collective action and intervention to be accomplished.   Our conceptual model offers a set of interesting and promising “epistemosocial” considerations for an in-depth examination of the dimensions essential for an organizational renewal of participation in the complex field of Global Health. Through the OTM, we conceive complex interventions as epistemic networks of participative practices (ENPP) composed of a wide range of actors organized around a double process of transcultural conceptualization of knowledge and inter-sector operationalization of action. This process is possible through a set of mechanisms of organizational instrumentation of learning.   In this way, the OTM and the concept of ENPP allow for a better understanding of the unceasing transition between the local integration of PP in the governance of complex interventions in the field of health and social services – such as LCH – and the broader processes of democratic reorganization of Public Health in a global context of institutional globalization. This could certainly help us to collectively construct a reflexive and manifest expression of democratic values proposed in Alma-Ata Declaration published in 1978 during the first International Conference on PHC.

Keyphrases: Participation, Recherche-action, Participation, Global Health, Reflexive Modernization, Primary Health Care, Local Health Councils, Action Research, Participatory Evaluation, Strategic and Systemic Translation, Collective Action, Organizational Transition Model