HEALTH, MEDICINE AND CIVIL-MILITARY RELATIONS
Date: 6-7 July, 2023
Venue: The Maison Française d’Oxford (MFO)
Organisers: OCHSMT, King’s College London, Kyung Hee University, Yonsei University and Aix-Marseille University and at Sciences Po Aix
Financial support: this workshop is supported by an Arts and Humanities Research Council research grant (‘Medicine and Conflict, c.1945-c.1980: The United Kingdom and the Savage Wars of Peace’, AH/T013656/1) and the Maison Française d’Oxford.
Military and civilian medicine and healthcare have different aims and priorities but are often closely linked. On the one hand, civilian health infrastructure, and the health status of the population as a whole, directly affect military health and healthcare. On the other, the military has played a significant part in shaping the landscape of health epidemiologically as well as through its contributions to medical science and healthcare systems. Deployed forces have also attempted to use medical interventions to positively influence the operational environment and to foster political stability. This workshop re-assesses some of these intersections between civilian and military domains. Its aim is to understand the role that medicine has played historically in conflict situations, as well as to explore some of the ways in which historical insights might be applied to ongoing and future situations.
<DAY 1>
13:30-14:00 Registration
14:00-14:15 Welcome and introduction (Mark Harrison & Benoit Pouget)
Session 1: Medical support in counter-insurgency campaigns
14:15-14:45 Benoit Pouget (Sciences Po Aix, benoit.pouget@univ-amu.fr)
Medicine in the war zone: Emergency administration of war wounded during the Indochina war 1946-1954
14:45-15:15 Atsuko Naono (University of Oxford, atsuko.naono@history.ox.ac.uk)
From the Burma campaign to the Malay emergency: disease, medicine, and jungle warfare
15:15-15:45 Refreshments
Session 2: Hearts & minds
15:45-16:45 Mark Harrison (University of Oxford, mark.harrison@history.ox.ac.uk) Medicine for hearts and minds: British counter-insurgency campaigns from Malaya to Dhofar (Keynote)
16:45-17:15 John DiMoia (Seoul National University, jdimoia@snu.ac.kr)
“Free Haircuts” and civic actions: Korean village outreach during the Vietnam War
<DAY 2>
Session 3: Caring for casualties
09:30-10:00 Insok Yeo (Yonsei University, isyeo@yuhs.ac)
Psychiatric casualties during the Korean War
10:00-10:30 Sophie Gueudet (Norwegian Institute of International Affairs, sophie_gueudet@hotmail.fr)
War wounds: post-war care for Republika Srpska’s veterans in Yugoslavia
10:30-11:00 Refreshments
Session 4: Humanitarian assistance
11:00-12:00 Bertrand Taithe (University of Manchester, bertrand.taithe@manchester.ac.uk)
Civilians at war? Representations and dilemmas of humanitarian medical relief in contemporary wars 1979-2022 (Keynote)
12:00-12:30 Dongkue Lee (Kyung Hee University, dleekyu@gmail.com)
The Scandinavian endeavour for the World Health Order: Medical assistance, UNKRA, and the National Medical Centre in Seoul, 1951-1958
Concluding comments
12:30-13:00 Martin Bricknell (King’s College London, martin.bricknell@kcl.ac.uk)
Observations and lessons for civil-military medical relations – an interpretation of the evidence (Concluding remarks)
13:00-14:00 Lunch
14:00-15:00 Discussion of future plans