Abstract
BackgroundIn 2012, the European Commission funded Go4Health—Goals and Governance for Global Health, a consortium of 13 academic research and human rights institutions from both Global North and South—to track the evolution of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and provide ongoing policy advice. This paper reviews the research outputs published between 2012 and 2016, analyzing the thematic content of the publications, and the influence on global health and development discourse through citation metrics.Findings and discussionAnalysis of the 54 published papers showed 6 dominant themes related to the SDGs: the formulation process for the SDG health goal; the right to health; Universal Health Coverage; voices of marginalized peoples; global health governance; and the integration of health across the other SDGs. The papers combined advocacy---particularly for the right to health and its potential embodiment in Universal Health Coverage—with qualitative research and analysis of policy and stakeholders. Go4Health’s publications on the right to health, global health governance and the voices of marginalized peoples in relation to the SDGs represented a substantial proportion of papers published for these topics. Go4Health analysis of the right to health clarified its elements and their application to Universal Health Coverage, global health governance, financing the SDGs and access to medicines. Qualitative research identified correspondence between perceptions of marginalized peoples and right to health principles, and reluctance among multilateral organizations to explicitly represent the right to health in the goals, despite their acknowledgement of their importance. Citation metrics analysis confirmed an average of 5.5 citations per paper, with a field-weighted citation impact of 2.24 for the 43 peer reviewed publications. Citations in the academic literature and UN policy documents confirmed the impact of Go4Health on the global discourse around the SDGs, but within the Go4Health consortium there was also evidence of two epistemological frames of analysis—normative legal analysis and empirical research—that created productive synergies in unpacking the health SDG and the right to health.ConclusionThe analysis offers clear evidence for the contribution of funded programmatic research—such as the Go4Health project—to the global health discourse.
Highlights
In 2012, the European Commission funded Go4Health—Goals and Governance for Global Health, a consortium of 13 academic research and human rights institutions from both Global North and South—to track the evolution of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and provide ongoing policy advice
Go4Health is an example of an academic research coalition that strongly advocated the right to health as a central component in the post-2015 international health agenda, as debate focused on the development agenda that would succeed the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) [8]
Citation analysis showed that Go4Health publications on the right to health, global health governance, and the voices of the marginalized, had a coherent message and represented a substantial proportion of all published papers identified for those themes in the policy discourse Table 3. shows Go4Health publications as a percentage of all papers published on the identified themes, based on a Scopus search
Summary
In 2012, the European Commission funded Go4Health—Goals and Governance for Global Health, a consortium of 13 academic research and human rights institutions from both Global North and South—to track the evolution of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and provide ongoing policy advice. Buse [6] advocates for prospective policy analysis—“analysis which seeks to understand the unfolding political-economy environment of policy change so as to support stakeholders to more effectively engage in policy processes”—which is capable of supporting and shaping health policy making. This policy analysis is commonly undertaken by advocacy coalitions, highly-integrated policy networks [6], with the potential to set agendas and reach decision makers [7]. The consortium included 13 research partners: ten academic institutions— including academics in global public health, international law and human rights [8], and four health rights advocacy organizations, from six continents combining the Global North and the Global South (Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, North and Latin America) (Table 1)
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