Promoting pro-health policies across regimes: Global AIDS institutions and the harm reduction debate

This article uses the ongoing policy debate over ‘harm reduction’ as a lens for examining the complex relationships between Global Health Governance and the global governance of other issue areas – in this case the global narcotics control regime. Examining the dynamics of policy entrepreneurship at this ‘interface’, it is argued that both material and ideational power matter – and that there is a need to better understand the potential influence that global health institutions have in other policy spheres and the extent to which ‘framing’ can be a successful advocacy strategy. Without denying the potential for policy entrepreneurship, it is argued that this case offers some insights into how power and influence operate at such interfaces, which can be important in better understanding the potential of global health institutions to successfully promote pro-health policies.