Spiritual_Wellness_Holistic_Health_and_the_Practic

CHAPTER
23
NEW HEALTH PROMOTION
MOVEMENT: A CRITICAL
EXAMINATION
A NN R OBERTSON
M EREDITH M INKLER
I n 1986, Marshall Becker wrote a paper entitled “ The Tyranny of Health Promotion, ”
in which he critiqued the individual lifestyle approach to health promotion and cautioned
against its tendency to equate “being ill ” with “being guilty ” and to substitute
“ personal health goals for more important, humane societal goals ” (p. 20). Since the
publication of that paper, we have witnessed a revolution in the field of health promotion.
Guided to a large extent by position papers disseminated by the World Health
Organization (WHO) Europe Health Promotion Office (1984), and furthered by the
Ottawa Charter (1986b), the Epp Report in Canada (Health & Welfare Canada, 1986),
the Healthy Cities project (Duhl), and others (Hancock, 1986; Labonte, 1986; Milio,
1981), this new health promotion movement has resulted in a fundamental shift in the
ways in which many health professionals think, talk, and write about health, the determinants
of health, and the strategies for achieving health. Both the philosophical core
and one of the central strategies of the new health promotion is articulated in the concept
of empowerment. The intent of this paper is to critically examine the concept of empowerment
and its relationship to the notions of health and community participation.