To Repair the World: Paul Farmer Speaks to the Next Generation

by Paul Farmer, Jonathan L. Weigel (Editor), Bill Clinton (Foreword by)

Overview

Doctor and social activist Paul Farmer shares a collection of charismatic short speeches that aims to inspire the next generation. One of the most passionate and influential voices for global health equity and social justice, Farmer encourages young people to tackle the greatest challenges of our times. Engaging, often humorous, and always inspiring, these speeches bring to light the brilliance and force of Farmer’s vision in a single, accessible volume.

A must-read for graduates, students, and everyone seeking to help bend the arc of history toward justice, To Repair the World:

• challenges readers to counter failures of imagination that keep billions of people without access to health care, safe drinking water, decent schools, and other basic human rights
• champions the power of partnership against global poverty, climate change, and other pressing problems today
• overturns common assumptions about health disparities around the globe by considering the large-scale social forces that determine who gets sick and who has access to health care
• discusses how hope, solidarity, faith, and hardbitten analysis have animated Farmer’s service to the poor in Haiti, Peru, Rwanda, Russia, and elsewhere
• leaves the reader with an uplifting vision: that with creativity, passion, teamwork, and determination, the next generations can make the world a safer and more humane place.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780520321151
Publisher:	University of California Press
Publication date:	11/19/2019
Series:	California Series in Public Anthropology , #29
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	296
Sales rank:	667,726
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.10(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Paul Farmer is cofounder of Partners In Health and Chair of the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School. His most recent book is Reimagining Global Health. Other titles include To Repair the World, Pathologies of Power: Health, Human Rights, and the New War on the Poor; Infections and Inequalities: The Modern Plagues; and AIDS and Accusation: Haiti and the Geography of Blame, all by UC Press.

Table of Contents

Foreword by President Bill Clinton
Introduction by Jonathan Weigel

Part I: Reimagining Equity

General Anesthesia for the (Young Doctor’s) Soul?
Brown Medical School, Commencement 2001

Epiphany, Metanoia, Praxis: Turning Road Angst into Hope—and Action
Boston College, Commencement 2005

Three Stories, Three Paradigms, and a Critique of Social Entrepreneurship
Skoll World Forum, Oxford University 2008

The Story of the Inhaler
College of the Holy Cross, Commencement 2012

Countering Failures of Imagination
Northwestern University, Commencement 2012

Part II: The Future of Medicine and the Big Picture

If You Take the Red Pill: Reflections on the Future of Medicine
Harvard Medical School, Class Day 2003

Medicine as a Vocation
University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, Commencement 2004

Haiti After the Earthquake
Harvard Medical School, Talks@Twelve Speaker Series 2010

The Tetanus Speech
University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, Commencement 2010

Part III: Health, Human Rights, and Unnatural Disasters

Global Health Equity and the Missing Weapons of Mass Salvation
Harvard School of Public Health, Commencement 2004

Making Public Health Matter
Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Commencement 2006

Unnatural Disasters and the Right to Health Care
Tulane School of Medicine, Commencement 2008

Exploring the Adjacent Possible
Georgetown University, Commencement 2011

Part IV: Service, Solidarity, Social Justice

Who Stands Fast?
Union Theological Seminary, Union Medal Acceptance Speech 2006

Courage and Compassion in the Time of Guantánamo
Emory University, Commencement 2007

Spirituality and Justice
All Saints Parish (Brookline, MA), Spirituality and Justice Award Acceptance Speech 2008

Making Hope and History Rhyme
Princeton University, Commencement 2008

The Drum Major Instinct
Boston University, Martin Luther King Jr. Day Celebration 2009

Accompaniment as Policy
Harvard Kennedy School of Government, Commencement 2011

Notes
Acknowledgments

Editorial Reviews

"The publication of this book is timely. It would make a perfect gift for a medical or biology graduate, but it would be inspiring to anyone who reads it. His speeches make one feel empowered ― to make a difference, to contribute to health policy, to accompany another who is struggling. In the speeches collected in To Repair the World, Dr. Farmer teaches us crucial lessons that we must all learn from, as scientists, as doctors, and as human beings."

Yale Journal of Biology and Medicine

"...[To Repair the World] does not disappoint."

Los Angeles Review of Books

""With humor and passion, medical anthropologist Paul Farmer advocates a cure for society and the planet."

Nature

""With humor and passion, medical anthropologist Paul Farmer advocates a cure for society and the planet."

Nature Lib

Farmer, Harvard professor and founder of Partners in Health, offers an anthology of 19 speeches on global health initiatives delivered between 2001 and 2012. Since his med school days in the 1980s, Farmer has been committed to building a viable health care system in Haiti. On January 12, 2010, he witnessed the devastating earthquake in Port-au-Prince and participated in the rescue effort. Despite self-deprecating remarks about being the "terminally unhip" successor of commencement speakers like Ali G, Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, Bono, and Will Ferrell, Farmer has addressed top-tier institu-tions like Oxford, Brown, and Johns Hopkins. Divided into four sections, the book opens with the sub-ject of social injustice in medical care, explores the future of medicine and "instruments of mass salva-tion" following natural disasters, and closes on the issue of human suffering. Addressing "insignificant others" along with newly-minted public servants, he urges today's graduates to become "accom-pagnateurs"—a Creole term he uses to describe a committed doctor. While Farmer admits to sermon-izing, readers will emerge with a heightened sense of the responsibilities and sacrifices required of fu-ture public servants. (May)

Publishers Weekly

"Paul Farmer’s anthology of speeches offers shorter narratives suited to a busy leader that exude a moral philosophy, blueprint, case histories and deep inspiration for the change of heart that must fuel American atonement and national healing.”
 

New York Times - Harriet A. Washington

"With humour and passion, medical anthropologist Paul Farmer advocates a cure for society and the planet."

Springer Nature