India's “tryst” with universal health coverage: Reflections on ethnography in Indian health policymaking

Abstract

In 2011, India stood at the crossroads of potentially major health reform. A High Level Expert Group (HLEG) on universal health coverage (UHC), convened by the Indian Planning Commission, proposed major changes in the structure and functioning of the country's health system. This paper presents reflections on the role of ethnography in policy-based social change for health in India, drawing from year-long participation in the aforementioned policy development process. It theorizes that international discourses have been (re)appropriated in the Indian case by recourse to both experience and evidence, resulting in a plurality of concepts that could be prioritized for Indian health reform. This articulation involved HLEG members exerting para-ethnographic labour and paying close attention to context, suggesting that ethnographic sensibilities can reside within the interactive and knowledge production practices among experts oriented toward policy change.