Ungovernable Life: Mandatory Medicine and Statecraft in Iraq

260 Pages·2017·2.587 MB·English

by  Omar Dewachi

Ungovernable Life
This page intentionally left blank
Ungovernable Life
Mandatory Medicine and Statecraft in Iraq
Omar Dewachi
Stanford University Press
Stanford, California
Stanford University Press
Stanford, California
©2017 by the Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any
means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or in
any information storage or retrieval system without the prior written permission
of Stanford University Press.
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free, archival-quality paper
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Al-Dewachi, Omar, author.
Title: Ungovernable life : mandatory medicine and statecraft in Iraq /
Omar Dewachi.
Description: Stanford, California : Stanford University Press, 2017. |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016055520 (print) | LCCN 2016056945 (ebook) |
ISBN 9780804784443 (cloth : alk. paper) | ISBN 9780804784450
(pbk. : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781503602694 (electronic)
Subjects: LCSH: Medical policy—Iraq—History. | National health
services—Iraq—History. | Medical care—Iraq—History. | Iraq—Politics
and government.
Classification: LCC RA395.I72 A53 2017 (print) | LCC RA395.I72 (ebook) |
DDC
362.109567--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016055520
ISBN 9-780-8047-8444-3 (cloth)
Typeset by Dovetail Publishing Services in 11/13.5 Adobe Garamond
To my parents,
Ekhlas and Abdulilah
This page intentionally left blank
Contents
Preface ix
Acknowledgments xv
Ungovernable Life: An Introduction 1
1 Intervention Pathologies 29
2 Vitality of the State 45
3 Doctors without Empires 65
4 The Royal College 83
5 Development and Its Discontents 105
6 Infants and Infantry 127
7 Empire of Patronage 151
Conclusion 171
Notes 185
Bibliography 211
Index 227
This page intentionally left blank
Preface
The questions that drive this book are inspired by my personal
experiences of growing up in Iraq and training as a medical doctor in
the aftermath of the 1991 Gulf War. On August 2, 1990, Iraqis woke up
to the news of their government’s swift invasion and the annexation of
Kuwait. Over the following weeks, a coalition of thirty-three countries,
led by the United States, had mobilized to “liberate” Kuwait. For ninety
days, the coalition pounded Iraq’s infrastructure, destroying the founda-
tions of a modern state. Operation Desert Storm targeted government
facilities and destroyed electricity grids, telephone lines, the water supply,
and sanitation systems. For more than a decade afterward, Iraqis were
subjected to one of the harshest experiments of war under UN economic
sanctions (1990–2003). The sanctions prohibited oil sales—Iraq’s main
export—and banned imports of goods, except for limited and selective
supplies of medicine and basic food items. Furthermore, Iraq was pre-
vented from importing material to fix its broken infrastructure.
Under the sanctions, Iraqis witnessed an acute deterioration in
everyday life as the infrastructure of the state crumbled. Health and
development indicators plummeted, and the country’s environment
was severely scarred. In effect, the sanctions induced an ecology of “state
failure,” where the besieged state became unable to restore its damaged
infrastructure to prewar conditions. This was further complicated by
the inability of the country’s advanced health-care system to respond
to the swelling burdens of the general population’s afflictions. The far-
reaching and detrimental effects of that war and sanctions—what Iraqis
refer to as al-hisar (the siege)—were determinative in shaping Iraq’s pre-
carious future for decades to come.