Unpacking complexity in public health interventions with the Actor-Network Theory

Abstract

This article proposes a sociologically informed theoretical and methodological framework to address the complexity of public health interventions (PHI). It first proposes three arguments in favour of using the Actor-Network Theory (ANT) for the framework. ANT: (1) deals with systems made of human and non-human entities and proposes a relational view of action; (2) provides an understanding of the intervention-context interactions and (3) is a tool for opening the intervention's black box. Three principles derived from ANT addressing theoretical problems with conceptualisation of PHI as complex systems are proposed: (1) to focus on the process of connecting the network entities instead of their stabilised form; (2) both human and non-human entities composing networks have performative capacities and (3) network and intervention shape one another. Three methodological guidelines are further derived: (1) the researcher's task consists in documenting the events that transform the network and intervention; (2) events must be ordered chronologically to represent the intervention's evolution and (3) a broad range of data is needed to capture complex interventions' evolution. Using ANT as a guide, this paper helps reconcile technicist and social views of PHI and provides a mean to integrate process and effect studies of interventions.

Keywords: Actor–Network theory; complex system perspective; public health intervention research.