ABSTRACT
This book has attempted to demonstrate that, despite growing evidence that health
promotion is emerging as a discipline in its own right (Bunton and Macdonald 1992),
it is still striving towards certainties, particularly in the area of effectiveness research and
quality assurance programmes. Uncertainties are both a strength, allowing the flexibility
to incorporate health promotion into various political ideologies, and a weakness, if it
is perceived as a universal panacea. Before any decisions can be made about its
effectiveness or quality, there is a need for international consensus on its meaning,
relevant terminology and structures post-Ottawa Charter: ‘Health promotion in its
present form is riven with contradictions in theory and practice’ (Kelly and Charlton
1995:90).
