A critical review of chiropractic through the lens of social justice

Established during 20th century America's period of individualism and capitalism and lead by charismatic individuals for most of its existence, the chiropractic profession has struggled to define itself. As evidenced by the lack of literature about social justice and chiropractic, the profession has spent little energy participating in the dialog or practice of social justice.

The greatest health threats inflict death and disability on the minority of society, representing an unjust distribution of morbidity and mortality upon the most disadvantaged. It is suggested that justice is the core value of public health and that social justice functions, “… to advance human well-being by improving health… by focusing on the needs of the most disadvantaged.” American culture, based on individualism and market justice, tends to view health as a personal matter bestowed upon those who can afford it and represents an ethic of the majority that shields it from the responsibilities of reducing the disease burden of society as a whole. Beauchamp has suggested that, “The public health ethic is a counter-ethic to market justice and the ethics of individualism as these are applied to the health problems of the public.”

This presentation discusses actions of the chiropractic profession through Beauchamp's four principles of social justice (controlling hazards of the world, preventing death and disability, participating in organized collective action, and equally sharing the burden of health disparity) and postulates future directions the profession might take to better participate in the practice of social justice and the field of public health.