Explains and illuminates the specific relationship between health professions and the state. Eight countries in Europe are examined and topical issues include: market policies, performance and quality, professional monopolies and expertise.

Contributors Introduction Part I: Professions and the State: Theoretical Issues 1. Governmentality and the Institutionalization of Expertise 2. Countervailing Powers: A Framework for Professions in Transition Part II: Health Professions and the State in Britain 3. Historical Perspectives 4. Restructuring Health and Welfare Professions in the UK 5. Shifting Spheres of Opportunity 6. Doctors, Peer Review and Quality Assurance 7. The Changing Response of the Medical Profession to Alternative Medicine in Britain 8. The British General Medical Council Health Professions and the State in Continental Europe 9. The Politics of the Spanish Medical Profession 10. The Belgian Medical Profession since the 1980s 11. Midwifery in the Netherlands 12. State Traditions and Medical Professionalization in Scandinavia 13. Medical Uncertainty and Gender-Based Work in the Medical Profession in the Nordic Countries