Is anybody there? Critical realism, chronic illness and the disability debate

Abstract

Taking as its point of departure the contested nature of the body, in mainstream theory and the sociology of health and illness alike, this paper seeks, albeit tentatively, to chart a critical realist alternative to these debates using the controversial terrain of chronic illness and disability as a case study. A critical realist approach, it is suggested, enables us to: (i) bring the biological body, impaired or otherwise, ‘back in’; (ii) relate the individual to society in a challenging, non‐conflationary or non ‘uni‐directional’ way; and (iii) rethink questions of identity, difference and the ethics of care through a commitment to real bodies andreal selves, real lives and real worlds. Within all this, it is argued,modern medicine does indeed, contra disability theory and postmodern calls for the pursuit of so‐called ‘arche‐health’, have a continuing role to play in the mitigation of human pain and suffering, including the realities of chronic disabling illness conditions and the associated ‘greying’ of Western populations.