The Politics of Health Care Reforms in Kenya and their Failure

Abstract

The current literature on the politics of social policy has two major shortcomings: health care reforms are undertheoretized and research on Anglophone Africa tends to neglect health reforms. To tackle this, a case study on Kenya presents (failed) re-forms such as universal or categorical free health care or the introduction of health insurance and the expansion of its coverage. The case study clearly shows that there is no single theoretical explanation of social policy reforms or their failure. Rather, there are different combination of factors at work in Kenya.