Routledge Handbook of Complementary and Alternative Medicine ― Perspectives from Social Science and Law

The provision and use of traditional, complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) has been growing globally over the last 40 years, although there have always been regions where it predominated. As CAM develops alongside and, sometimes, integrates with conventional medicine, this Handbook provides the first major overview of its regulation and professionalization from social science and legal perspectives.

A comprehensive overview, the book draws on historical and international comparative research to provide a rigorous and thematic examination of the field. It argues that many popular and policy debates are stuck in a polarized and largely asocial discourse, and that interdisciplinary social science perspectives, theorising diversity in the field, provide a much more robust evidence base for policy and practice in the field. Divided into five sections, it covers:

• Multi-disciplinary perspectives
• Professional identity
• Risk and regulation
• The role of knowledge and evidence
• Looking to the future.

This important volume will interest social science and legal scholars researching complementary and alternative medicine, professional identify and health care regulation as well as ethicists, historians and health policymakers and regulators.

Nicola K. Gale is Research Fellow in Medical Sociology at the University of Birmingham, UK.

Jean V. McHale is Professor of Health Care Law and Director of the Centre for Health Law, Science and Policy, University of Birmingham, UK.