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Vermont and Healthcare Reform Organizing: Human Rights Promise and Praxis

Sun, August 23, 2:30 to 4:10pm, TBA

Abstract

Activists in the fight for healthcare around the globe have utilized the framework of human rights to advance their claims. Recently, the human rights framework has appeared as a central dimension of the recent efforts in the state of Vermont to pass a piece of state legislation in 2011 aimed at providing universal healthcare to all residents of Vermont. Yet, a scrutinizing analysis of the organizing efforts in Vermont reveals a deeply complex understanding of and engagement with human rights. Key organizations and activists in Vermont have innovated a new approach to utilizing not just the “Healthcare is a Human Right” frame, but a deep ethic of rights-based power-building in their organizing approach. At the same time, not all actors or organizations coalesced around this frame or this approach, which has created some tensions within the movement, and broader speculation about what might lead to success for the single payer movement in a post-Affordable Care Act health policy landscape. In this article that analyzes the case of Vermont in the context of the broader national movement for single payer, universal healthcare, we present the findings of 36 in-depth interviews with national and state leaders in the movement for universal healthcare. Our research contributes to social movements literature, particularly related to human rights and rights-based organizing around healthcare in the U.S. context.

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