Hybrid forum or network? The social and political construction of an international ‘technical consultation’: Male circumcision and HIV prevention

Abstract

The technical consultation in Montreux, organised by World Health Organization and UNAIDS in 2007, recommended male circumcision as a method for preventing HIV transmission. This consultation came out of a long process of releasing reports and holding international and regional conferences, a process steered by an informal network. This network's relations with other parties is analysed along with its way of working and the exchanges during the technical consultation that led up to the formal adoption of a recommendation. Conducted in relation to the concepts of a ‘hybrid forum’ and ‘network’, this article shows that the decision was based on the formation and consolidation of a network of persons. They were active in all phases of this process, ranging from studies of the recommendation's efficacy, feasibility and acceptability to its adoption and implementation. In this sense, this consultation cannot be described as the constitution of a ‘hybrid forum’, which is characterised by its openness to a debate as well as a plurality of issues formulated by the actors and of resources used by them. On the contrary, little room was allowed for contradictory discussions, as if the decision had already been made before the Montreux consultation.

Keywords:

• international conferences
• science studies
• male circumcision
• HIV prevention
• international public health

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Florian Voros for his work as research assistant and Florence Paterson for her careful readings and suggestion on a previous version of the paper. This article has been translated from French and edited by Noal Mellott (CNRS, Paris, France). We would also like to thank the two anonymous reviewers, whose very accurate comments helped to improve the quality of the paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. For some examples of such STS studies in this field with different theoretical focus, see Eggen (2012), Hodžić (2013), Knaapen (2013) and Stirrat (2000).

2. It was not possible to know who was invited, those who were not and those who declined the invitation.

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded by the ANRS as part of the ‘developing countries’ project (Appel d'offres 1 2009). It was submitted to and approved by the Institutional Review Board of INSERM (Opinion Number 01-012/27, April 2009).