Summary
Public health approaches play an important role in promoting a community care culture (e.g. caring communities). Public health in its ethical and existential dimensions is called upon to involve people in shaping their living and health conditions through an open process of reflection and discussion about what makes a good life and death. In this maieutic learning process, forms of Socratic discussions as care dialogues can be supportive. These make it possible to take part in one another in a deeper sense (Compassion & Care) and to shape communal care as a “fabric” of care relationships in the third social space - between the formal organizations and the family. The communal care culture requires a twofold paradigm shift: 1) not thinking about care in terms of the organizations providing care, but rather from the everyday life and relationships of citizens, and 2) litigating an ethic of communal care, an everyday ethic. Public health as a communal care culture supports the promotion of social framework conditions that make “good care” viable.
You can find the article here (in German).