Performing Populist Health Policy: The Case of the English National Health Service

In this chapter, Speed and Mannion develop understandings of the genesis of populist health policies and their impact on professional practice. In a case study drawn from the 2015/2016 excess weekend mortality controversy in the UK, they consider how various political actors utilised a populist political frame to structure the debate, and the influence this had on the medical profession regarding the imposition, by government, of a new contract of employment. Implications for the medical profession in the context of wider political (national and international) contexts are elucidated from the case study.