ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the recent history of global clinical trials in India and the ethical and political questions they have raised. It considers the utility of concepts of violence and non-violence in understanding how apparently safe and desirable health interventions, initiated with benign intent, become the cause of ferment. It concludes that struggles to mitigate the ‘symbolic violence’ involved in such trials is worthwhile, even if the way forward remains unclear, in India’s highly unequal and inequitable society.
