Question

Why does Paul Farmer argue that the death of Acephie Joseph was not just a medical issue, but an example of structural violence?

Answer 1

To answer this question first we need to understand the meaning of structural violence.

Structural violence refers to all the suffering experienced by an individual, group of individuals, or a community caused by different social factors that could be economic, political, religious, racial, and so on. This indirect means of violence stop an individual or groups from achieving their full potential and having adequate choices to decide from. What makes this type of violence dangerous is that they are so passively present in our society that we have become so used to them and do not see how they are there.

When we talk about the case of Acephie Joseph, Paul Farmer argues that the death of Acephie Joseph was not just a medical issue, but an example of structural violence because he was able to track down that Acephie’s death from AIDS was a subsequent stage or we can say the ultimate consequence of long term structural violence she had been facing.

It all started from government-induced poverty that essentially coerced her into a sexual relationship with a local army captain and from there she got HIV/AIDS which later developed into pneumonia and finally after a long term course of suffering she died.