Special Book Event with Jennifer J. Prah

In a world beset by serious and unconscionable health disparities, by dangerous contagions that can circle our globalized planet in hours, and by a bewildering confusion of health actors and systems, humankind needs a new vision, a new architecture, new coordination among renewed systems to ensure central health capabilities for all. Dr. Jennifer J. Prah’s book Global Health Justice and Governance (Oxford University Press, 2018) lays out the critical problems facing the world today and offers a new theory of justice and governance as a way to resolve these seemingly intractable issues.

In this conversation with author Dr. Jennifer J. Prah and Perry World House Deputy Director LaShawn R. Jefferson, Dr. Prah will address the fundamental responsibility of society to ensure human flourishing; the central role that health plays in flourishing and how that places a unique claim on our public institutions and resources to ensure central health capabilities to reduce premature death and avoid preventable morbidities; and the new global health architecture that is desperately needed in order to address staggering inequalities, imperiling epidemics, and inadequate systems.

Jennifer J. Prah is the Amartya Sen Professor of Health Equity, Economics, and Policy in the School of Social Policy & Practice (SP2) and the former Associate Dean for Global Studies and Faculty Chair at the Center for High Impact Philanthropy (CHIP) at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Prah is the founder and director of the Health Equity and Policy Lab (HEPL) that conducts quantitative and qualitative research on the equity implications of health and social policies. She served previously at the World Bank as speechwriter to president James D. Wolfensohn and on the health and development satellite secretariat of WHO Director-General Gro Harlem Brundtland’s Transition Team.