Talcott Parsons, the Sick Role and Chronic Illness

Abstract

Parsons’ sick role concept has become problematic in the face of the increased significance of chronic illnesses and the growing emphasis on life-style centred health promotion. Both developments de-limit the medical system so that it extends into the world of health, fundamentally changing the doctor-patient relationship. But as the sick role is firmly based on the reciprocities of a resiliently capitalist achievement society it still informs normative expectations in the field of health and illness. The precarious social position of chronic patients between being governed by and being consumers of medicine, I will argue, can only be adequately understood if one involves, as Parsons did, the moral economy surrounding health and illness.