«The Ethics of Health Research: Participation, Observation, and Power in Practice»
26 March 2026
at University of Bern
Ethnographic and participatory approaches have become central to health and health care research, offering situated insights into how illness experiences, professional practices, institutional logics, and both health related inequalities and structural inequities unfold in everyday contexts.
These forms of inquiry rely on relational engagement and sustained interaction—conditions in which ethical questions arise dynamically and cannot be fully anticipated through conventional, procedurally oriented ethics frameworks.
This symposium brings together researchers and co-researchers from medical anthropology, qualitative health research, and participatory research to explore ethics as situated practice, process, and relationship. It is participatory in the sense that questions and issues at stake will be discussed with all participants, and that these discussions will serve as a basis for outlining core principles for ethics in practice.
Principal Organisers:
Karin van Holten, Kurt Zurfluh, Sandra Staudacher, Eva Soom Ammann
«The Ethics of Health Research: Between Biomedicine and Anthropology»
27 March 2026
at University of Bern
The Swiss Human Research Act (HRA) lays the legal basis regulating research done in the health domain. As such it has important implications for anthropological research studying health and biomedicine, its institutions, practices, and experiences. One of the key issues relates to the ambiguity of medical / health anthropological research as entering (or not) in the scope of the HRA, with the subsequent necessity (or not) to apply for approval from cantonal ethical commissions. This creates tensions between institutionalized and processual ethics (Perrin et al. 2018). It raises also fundamental and practical questions for anthropology and related social sciences, and shapes interdisciplinary collaborations and dialogue.
As the Human Research Act applies to “health-related-data”, what are the different understandings at stake when defining them? What are the scope and boundaries of “health”? Is ethical approval from cantonal commissions only needed for “patients” or also for professionals? What are then the various implications between involving patients, citizen, or health professionals? In order to reflect on the challenges and issues raised by the institutional and biomedical framing of “ethics” of health research for the anthropology of health and medicine, and allied social sciences, the Commissions Ethical and Deontological Think Tank (EDTT) and Medical Anthropology Switzerland (MAS) organize a one-day workshop on March 27, 2026. It will take place at the University of Bern, Hauptgebäude, Kuppelraum, 104, 117, 217.
Organized by:
Medical Anthropology Switzerland (MAS)
& Ethical and Deontological Think Tank (EDTT)
Nolwenn Bühler, Anna Mann, Aline Sigrist
Archive
2025 MAS Symposium «Together in the Nursing Home: Exploring Sociality in Residential Long-Term Care». Programm
2024 MAS Workshop «Trajectories of Gender in Global Health: Where are we going?». Programm
2022 MAS Symposium «The Datafication of Health: Novel distributions and reconfigurations of expertise». Programm
2022 Exploring Expertise. MAS Symposium. Programm
2022Covid-19 through the lens of social sciences in Switzerland. Programm
2021The Novel Stakes of Social Medicine. MAS Kolloquium. Programm
2020Partizipative Entwicklung von Caring Communities in der Schweiz - Interdisziplinäre Perspektiven. MAS Symposium. Programm
2019 Platform for Exchange among Swiss Health Social Scientists. A joint colloquium by Medical Anthropology Switzerland, MAS & Geneva Platform for Social Science and Global Health, GpS2. Programm
2019Making Medicine in Austere Times: Materialities, Moralities and Policies of Care. MAS Symposium. Programm
2019 Versicherungsmedizin und Medizinethnologie. MAS Kolloquium. Programm
2018 Cultural Competence at the Intersection of Medical Anthropology and Medicine. Steps to take from Medical Education to Care of Patients. MAS Symposium. Programm
2017 Transfigurationen: Medizin macht Gesellschaft macht Medizin. Konferenz der MAS in Zusammenarbeit mit der Arbeitsgruppe Medical ANthropology der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Völkerkunde (DGV e.V.) und Wiener Dialoge der Medizinanthropologie. Programm / Konferenzbericht
2016 Adolescents' Participation in Health: Critical Reflections at the Intersection of Anthropology and Public Health. MAS Kolloquium. Programm
2015Healthcare for [Undocumented] Migrants. Migrants' and Provers' Perspectives. MAS Kolloquium. Programm
2015 Medical Anthropology at the Heart of Public Health and Biomedicine. MAS Symposium. Programm
2014 Social Anthropology and Global Transformations. MAS Panel. Programm
2014 Das Lebensende und die totale soziale Institution. Interdisziplinäre sozialwissenschaftliche Perspektiven. MAS Kolloquium. Programm
2014 Normierte Kindheit. MAS Symposium. Programm
2013 Medical Anthropology at Home. MAS Panel. Programm
2013 Enabling Disability and Processes of Learning. MAS Symposium. Programm
2012 MAS Colloquium with Prof. Anita Hardon (University of Amsterdam). Programm
2012 "Shattering Culture" - Diversity in Health Care. MAS Symposium. Programm
2012 Partizipation von Kindern im Gesundheitssystem am Beispiel von Diabetes / Child participation in diabetes healthcare. Tagung der MAS in Zusammenarbeit mit dem Marie Meierhofer Institut. Programm
2011 Gesundheit - Krankheit: Vernetzungstreffen für qualitativ Forschende. MAS Panel. Programm
2011 Global Health Perspectives from Medical Anthropology. MAS Symposium. Programm
2010 Datenanalyse in der Grounded Theory. MAS Forschungskolloquium. Programm
2010 "In my eyes..." Redefining children as actors of health: Participatory Medical Anthropology of Childhood. MAS Symposium. Programm
2010 Themen, Debatten, Anwendungsbereiche der Medizinethnologie. MAS Panel. Programm
2009 Terres promises - Paradis Perçus / Terres conquises - Paradis méconnus. Symposium der MAS in Zusammenarbeit mit der Schweizerischen Akademie für Psychosomatische und Psychosoziale Medizin. Programm
2008Masterclass zu Vertrauen und Gesundheit / Vertrauen und Konflikt. MAS Panel. Programm
2008 Primary Health Care and Social Equity - Illusion or Reality? MAS Conference. Programm
2007 Alter und Migration. Symposium der MAS in Zusammenarbeit mit dem Nationalen Forum Alter & Migration. Programm DE / Programm FR
2006 Une journee interdisciplinaire "De l'efficacite: entre technique et symbole". MAS Kolloquium in Zusammenarbeit mit dem Institut d’anthropologie et de sociologie, Unité d’anthropologie de la santé de l’Université de Lausanne und dem Centre intercantonal d’information sur les croyances (CIC) de Genève. Programm
2006 Narratives: Interdisciplinary Perspectives. MAS Symposium. Programm
2005 Methoden qualitativer Datenanalyse im Bereich Gesundheit und Krankheit. MAS Kolloquium. Programm
2005 Häusliche Pflege und Rolle des Haushalts. Ein mikro-ökologische Zugang zur Gesundheit. MAS Panel im Rahmen der SEG Konferenz. Programm
2004 Die Politik der Emotionen. Zur Wechselwirkung zwischen neuen psychiatrischen Erklärungsmodellen und sozialen Veränderungen. MAS Symposium. Programm, Abstracts
2003 La santé en débat. Politiques de la co-disciplinarité. Colloque organisé par la Commission Interdisciplonaire d'Aanthropologie Médicale (CIAM) / Medical Anthropology of Switzerland (MAS) Programm
2002 Medizinethnologie im Spannungsfeld von Theorie und Praxis / Anthropologie Médicale entre Théeorie et Pratique. 10. IKME / CIAM-Symposium (Programm)