Epidemics and History

Epidemics and History: Disease, Power and Imperialism Paperback – November 10, 1999

Author: Sheldon Watts | Language: English | ISBN: 0300080875 | Format: PDF, EPUB

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Epidemics and History: Disease, Power and Imperialism – November 10, 1999
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• Paperback: 416 pages
• Publisher: Yale University Press; 1 edition (November 10, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0300080875
• ISBN-13: 978-0300080872
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #96,778 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #40 in Books > Textbooks > Medicine & Health Sciences > Medicine > Special Topics > History
  • #51 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Sociology > Medicine

Sheldon Watts’ Epidemics and History: Disease, Power and Imperialism argues that diseases and disease Constructs were used as tools to reinforce imperialist power. Watts defines a disease Construct as a perception “arrived at through a complex of cultural filters… [that] determined what – if anything – should be done in an attempt to limit disease transmission.” (p. xv) Positing that diseases spread as an “unintended consequence of [imperialistic] Development” and were often used to justify social policing, he concludes that epidemics were utilized as a route to power legitimization. (p. xiv)

According to Watts, those in power used disease Constructs as tool of social discrimination and ostracization. He posits “accusations [of disease] were merely a ploy to put inconvenient people out of the way.” (p. 48) For example, the Construct of leprosy justified the imprisonment of those on society’s periphery to leprosaria during the Great Leper Hunt, and Watts concludes that a majority of those imprisoned were erroneously condemned. Later archeological studies have shown that the bones of the condemned had no lesions consistent with Hansen’s disease. The bubonic plague also legitimized elitist execution and consolidation of power. The plague allowed for “the growth of interventionist agencies” which violently repressed Jews, regulated burials, and mandated then new quarantine procedures. (p. 24)

Watts also argues that disease Constructs created jobs and were used to justify imperial policies. During the period of The Great Leper Hunt, the clergy was expanding beyond the needs of existing congregations. Conveniently, the growing number of leprosaria “provided jobs for thousands of priests who otherwise would have no altars before which to perform their sacred rites.” (p.

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