Obvious overlap, and a number of interest areas and individual interests not named here. This outlines only a few main clusters of interest currently being worked on:
| HEALTH SYSTEMS STRENGTHENING | COMMUNITY MAPPING | BOUNDARY LEADERSHIP |
| PSYCHO-SOCIAL SUPPORT | HIV/AIDS & BEYOND | COMPLEXITIES
...this page is currently under reconstruction and development...
RELIGION IN HEALTH SYSTEMS STRENGTHENING
There is a critical lack of information on the way religion works within health systems and services. This is most often the area where the question 'so what?' gets asked, and the demands for 'hard evidence-based data' are put forward. There are many groups and individuals with an interest in this area.
There are macro, meso and micro level questions being urgently put forward. For example: where is the place of the faith-based health facility in modern health systems? How do faith-based facilities and systems perform or operate differently? How do 'intangibles' such as trust or motivational factors impact on faith-based health services?...more information and literature reviews coming here soon...
MAPPING AND UNDERSTANDING COMMUNITY HEALTH ASSETS
Research has demonstrated that a large amount of activity on the ground by religious entities and the community organisations affiliated to them, though vital for dealing with the current health challenges are either invisible to, or not well understood by those responsible for health- or community systems strengthening. Deepening our understanding and increasing the visibility of these assets is likely to contribute significantly to public engagement with health research and strengthening community systems as a result. As IRHAP and partner studies have demonstrated, meaningful mapping and engagement of religious health assets (RHAs) must take into account the capacities and agency of religious health structures and people, their socio-political context, and the wide range of medical, non-medical, and faith services provided. Mapping religious health assets, be they community groups, congregations, health facilities or the trust that holds them together, remains a critical area for engagement. 'Mapping' is used here in the broadest sense to mean both the process and result of making visible both tangible and intangible assets and their relationships...more information and literature reviews coming here...
BOUNDARY LEADERSHIP AND COLLABORATION
Collaboration is frequently fraught with obstacles, between religious perspectives, between religious and secular perspectives, between groups with different intentions and agendas. Issues of leadership capacity building, co-literacy development and collaboration are of growing importance within the rapidly evolving field. The diverse range of actors seeking to collaborate frequently find themselves speaking in different 'languages' that require collaborative learning and 'translation'. Future and current leaders require training and support in crossing disciplinary and cultural boundaries. Such capacity-building is an important step in enhancing collaboration. This interest area cluster together a range of interests, including: boundary leadership, governance, co-literacy, intercultural communication, practice-research engagement, transdisciplinary research, inter-faith diloague, common ground, intermediaries, etc...more information and literature reviews coming here...
HIV/AIDS AND BEYOND
A substantial part of IRHAP's previous focus has been on HIV/AIDS in the African context - and work continues from that basis. However, there is a growing abundance of material addressing the religious response to HIV/AIDS. We begin to ask, what have we learnt from engagement with HIV/AIDS that can intelligently be applied to the other health crises or development concerns? What are the key missing gaps in our knowledge of the religious response to health and illness that continue to be overlooked? What have we learnt about health promotion and intervention through communities of faith? ...more information and literature reviews coming here soon...
POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE EFFECTS
An 'assets-based approach' does not attempt to side-step the fact that religion often has a negative or detrimental impact on health and development. Unfortunately, given the absence of systematic evidence, anecdote often drives decision-making. This cluster focuses on building a balanced evidence-base which weighs both positive and negative effects of religion on health and development...more information and literature reviews coming here...
RELIGION, COMMUNITY AND 'PSYCHO-SOCIAL' SUPPORT
This research area draws together a rapidly emerging interest in the effects of religion on community health, particularly through the lens of community psychology and sociology. There are currently two main interest areas within this cluster. 1) A cluster of experts in a 'Mental Health and Faith Communities' reference group (supported by the World Council of Churches) working on different facts of mental health, in the context of faith communities. Their main areas of interest are: Mental Health Institutional Group-faith based hospital benchmarking, Theology and Mental Health, Community Mental Health, Integrated Spirituality and Mental Health, and Gender Specific Issues in Mental Health. 2) The Spiritual Capacities project - which seeks to understand the positive mediating influences of faith, religion and spirituality on self-inflicted and interpersonal violence involving males in contexts of historical colonization in specific communities in South Africa and the USA, for the purposes of violence prevention and safety and peace promotion. Other linked areas of interest in this cluster are around issues of 'resilience', and congregations as 'safe spaces'...more information and literature reviews coming here...
COMPLEXITIES
An emerging interest group on issues of 'complexity' as it emerges in health systems, and in particulat at the interface between religion and public health...more information and literature reviews coming here...
