Social Theory and Nursing

What is the value of social theory to nursing? What are the implications of overlooking or excluding the social for nursing knowledge and practice? These are some of the questions debated in this lively new book which aims to tease out the tensions, contradictions and synergies between two starkly different intellectual paradigms. Leading scholars consider how social theories have infiltrated nursing, whether the outcome has been productive or not, and what solutions are available to answer some of the challenges posed. Exploring the philosophical, theoretical, empirical and political dimensions of its subject, this is a robust and wide-ranging analysis and critique.

Despite noteworthy exceptions, nursing’s literature largely disregards the ways in which social and sociological theory permeates, guides and shapes research, education, and practice. Likewise, social theory’s ability to position nursing within wider structures of healthcare and educational provision is similarly and puzzlingly downplayed. The questions nurses ask and the problems they face cannot however, adequately be addressed without engaging with social and sociological theory and, to progress this engagement, contributors to this book explore how social theories are used by and might apply to nursing and nursing practice.

The book draws on a wide range of perspectives – philosophical, theoretical, empirical and political – to offer a robust and wide-ranging critique and analysis. Social Theory and Nursing is essential reading for nursing researchers, academics and educators, as well as scholars and researchers in medical sociology, medicine and allied health.