A new book by a University of Illinois at Chicago scholar examines how the AIDS epidemic impacted American politics in the 1980s and 1990s and argues that the era was not as politically conservative as it is often characterized.
In "Infectious Ideas: U.S. Political Responses to the AIDS Crisis" ( University of North Carolina Press, 2009 ) , Jennifer Brier, UIC assistant professor of gender and women's studies and history, writes how the crisis, in the face of the expanding New Right, influenced American political matters involving health care and foreign policy, reproductive health, gay and lesbian rights and racial justice.
"As the recent debate over health care reform has shown, arguments over the best way to keep people healthy are fundamentally political as well as medical," Brier said.
"In the first decades of the AIDS epidemic, this point was put in sharp contrast as various constituencies -- from AIDS activists to health care service providers to government officials -- argued over what was necessary to deal with, and respond to, the multiple crises produced by the emerging AIDS epidemic," she said.
Contrary to standard historical narratives of conservatism that maintain AIDS served as a rallying point for conservative activists during this period, Brier contends that AIDS divided conservatives.One example of the discord was between former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop and Gary Bauer, who served as under secretary of education, and later, as chief domestic policy adviser for President Reagan.
Brier writes that the conservatives fought over the role of testing for HIV, the promotion of condom use, and the need for conversations about sexual practices as the best way to change people's behavior. "While Koop was never entirely successful in implementing policies that acknowledged people's sexuality, Bauer was equally stymied when trying to enact AIDS policies that were driven by his strict definition of morality," she said.
"The disagreement among administration conservatives became even more visible as the Reagan administration entered the global AIDS arena in the late 1980s," Brier writes.
The book includes a look at how AIDS workers, a group Brier defines as those committed to addressing the effects of AIDS, were made up of contrasting entities such as gay and lesbian media, AIDS service organizations, private philanthropies and the U.S. State Department. Brier argues that their combined efforts helped to shape progressive politics in the 21st century.
For more information about UIC, please visit www.uic.edu
FROM A NEWS RELEASE
