New life in old frames: HIV, development and the ‘AIDS plus MDGs’ approach

Abstract

There have been recent indications that the primacy of AIDS among global health issues may be under threat. In this article we examine one response to have emerged from the AIDS policy community as a result of this perceived threat: the ‘AIDS plus Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)’ approach, which argues that the AIDS response (the focus of MDG6) is essential to achieving the other MDG targets by 2015, stressing the two-way relationship between AIDS and other development issues. By framing AIDS in this way, the AIDS plus MDGs approach draws on an established narrative of a ‘virtuous circle’ between health and development, but at the same time makes some important concessions to critics of the AIDS response. This article – the first critical academic analysis of the AIDS plus MDGs approach – uses this case to illuminate aspects of the utilisation of framing in global health, shedding light both on the extent to which new framings draw upon established ‘common sense’ narratives as well as the ways in which framers must adapt to the changing material and ideational context in which they operate.

Keywords:

• AIDS
• framing
• AIDS plus MDGs
• development
• poverty
• MDGs

Acknowledgements

This paper draws on insights about AIDS as a development issue gathered during interviews conducted by the authors in 2010–2011 with key individuals and organisations in London, New York, Washington, DC, and Geneva. This research has been made possible through funding from the European Research Council under the European Community's Seventh Framework Programme – Ideas Grant 230489 GHG. All views expressed in this article remain those of the authors.