ABSTRACT
A global health world based on non-state actors has been evolving for as long as the state system, and this is a process continuing towards an ever-more advanced form of global governance since it is a policy area that starkly exposes the limitations of sovereignty. The inappropriateness of the traditional high politics/low politics distinction in international relations, that prioritizes state military and economic interests over other human needs, is most clearly apparent when considering health issues. Recognition of this can be dated back to the 1940s when David Mitrany, building on the writings of Leonard Woolf during the First World War, developed the theory of functionalism, prescribing and predicting a future post-Westphalian world order in which peoples’ needs would be met by functional international non-governmental organizations rather than by states (Mitrany 1975, Woolf 1916).
