Globalising dementia research: echoes of racialisation and colonialism

Abstract

This paper offers some provocations regarding the contemporary globalisation of dementia research. I begin with a brief account of the late 20th-century genesis of the dementia research economy in the US and subsequent initiatives to extend that research across the majority world. I then trouble this political movement. I consider racialisation in dementia research as a parallel process to globalisation, with minoritised groups being positioned as new subjects for moral and knowledge claims regarding dementia. I suggest resonances with critiques of the global mental health movement as a technology of coloniality, which I argue are relevant to the current globalisation of dementia research. I contend that majority world populations are being positioned – scientifically and morally – as new research sites and as examples of why Anglo-American approaches to dementia are superior. These parallels require critical gerontologists to ask who is benefiting from the globalisation of dementia.