ABSTRACT
Migrant AIDS Group catered to immigrants from Turkey and their descendants–the largest migrantic community in Germany–and later to Muslims in general. International governmental contacts stimulated state agencies in the late 1980s to foster AIDS services for ethnic minorities. They recruited an association of Turkish health professionals to set up and host Migrant AIDS Group. Migrant AIDS Group itself was a professional social work project rather than a membership organization, although it did try–with limited success–to mobilize volunteers for its work. The following analysis will thus provide further insight into professionalism as a kind of civic action. Medical professionalism has different strands that lend themselves in various degrees to political activism. Pertinent to the present purpose, it may inspire a kind of heroism in pursuit of exemplary virtues, such as rational judgment, moral principles, risk-taking, independent thinking, assuming responsibility, pursuit of knowledge or improving society.
