The Eclipse of Care and the Italian Job Between Managerial Logic and the Enigma of Health.

A universal healthcare system historically recognised for medical humanism is undergoing systematic defunding through a fiscal threshold of 6.2% of GDP. This analysis examines how New Public Management (NPM) has orchestrated an ontological displacement of clinical practice, transforming medicine fro...

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Publicado en:Journal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice Vol. 32; no. 4; pp. 1 - 6
Autor principal: Polo, Raul Marco
Formato: review tables/charts Journal Article
Publicado: Wiley-Blackwell Jun2026
Acceso en línea:Ver este registro en EBSCOhost
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      dt: Jun2026
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      pub: Wiley-Blackwell
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        194811185
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        10.1111/jep.70469
        194811185
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        atl: The Eclipse of Care and the Italian Job Between Managerial Logic and the Enigma of Health.
      aug:
        au: Polo, Raul Marco
        affil: Orthopaedic Department ‐ Clinica Ortopedica, University Hospital Parma – Italy, Parma, Italy
      sug:
        subj:
          Universal Health Care
          Health Care Reform
          Health Resource Allocation
          Ethics, Medical
          Professional Autonomy
          Patient Centered Care
          Italy
          Narrative Medicine
          Health Expenditures
          Waiting Lists
          Philosophy
          Sociological Theory
      ab: A universal healthcare system historically recognised for medical humanism is undergoing systematic defunding through a fiscal threshold of 6.2% of GDP. This analysis examines how New Public Management (NPM) has orchestrated an ontological displacement of clinical practice, transforming medicine from a patient‐centred healing art into a managerially‐controlled process of data extraction and fiscal optimisation. Methods: This paper employs critical philosophical analysis grounded in hermeneutical phenomenology and contemporary social theory, drawing on the work of Martin Heidegger, Hans‐Georg Gadamer, Emmanuel Levinas, Achille Mbembe, and Giorgio Agamben. The analysis interrogates how NPM‐driven austerity in healthcare constitutes a form of ontological violence that simultaneously instrumentalizes patients and strips physicians of clinical autonomy and practical wisdom. Findings: We identify five mechanisms through which managerializaton destroys authentic clinical encounter: (1) ontological reduction of patients to 'standing‐reserve' (Bestand); (2) destruction of meditative thinking in favour of calculative efficiency; (3) elimination of practical wisdo'm (Phronesis); (4) violation of ethical infinity through fiscal totalisation; and (5) creation of necropolitical zones through waiting‐list abandonment. A Constitutional Court judgement has declared that 'irreducible rights must affect the budget, not vice versa'—a principle routinely violated through systematic underfunding. Conclusions: Reclaiming authentic clinical practice requires both material correction (funding floor of 7.5% GDP) and philosophical resistance. Narrative medicine and temporally‐protected clinical encounters represent acts of political resistance against managerial logic. This case study warns that even robust universal systems can be destroyed through bureaucratic defunding masquerading as fiscal responsibility.
      pubtype: Academic Journal
      doctype:
        review
        tables/charts
        Journal Article
      ougenre: Article
    language: English
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