Can We Talk? Structured Paths to Better Communication

Can we talk?

Imagine your life as a huge flat canvas. Colorless, empty. Dull as ditchwater. Then start playing with it. Put in some undulations, mountains – hard to cross, but with great views from the top. Put in some rivers and seas – dangerous but nourishing and full of adventure. Put in some light and shade, that give shape to the day. Put in some dampness and dry areas, that give seasonal texture. Add ...

Computer-Mediated Communication: Can we Make it Better?

Computer-mediated communication (CMC) is fundamentally different to face-to-face (FTF) communication. The low bandwidth of CMC filters out important social and contextual cues, which results in behaviour in users that is different to FTF communication. There are a number of social psychological theories that attempt to explain why reduced social cues in CMC affect behaviour. This work attempts ...

We must--and we can--do better.

We Need to Talk About Corruption in Health Systems

The health sector consistently appears prominently in surveys of perceived corruption, with considerable evidence that this has serious adverse consequences for patients. Yet this issue is far from prominent in the international health policy discourse. We identify five reasons why the health policy community has been reluctant to talk about it. These are the problem of defining corruption, the...

Why We Must Talk About Institutional Corruption to Understand Wrongdoing in the Health Sector; Comment on “We Need to Talk About Corruption in Health Systems”

While various forms of corruption are common in many health systems around the world, defining wrongdoing in terms of legality and the use of public office for private gain obstructs our understanding of its nature and intractability. To address this, I suggest, we must not only break the silence about the extent of wrongdoing in the health sector, but also talk differe...