Power and place: Uncovering the politics of global medical education

CONTEXT: Politics is characterised by power relations, and the deployment of power is inescapably political. In an increasingly globalised and interconnected modern world, politics is shaping the field of medical education more than ever before. Global frameworks that classify peoples and places are political tools that are fundamentally shaped by hegemonic knowledge systems. Despite this, they continue to form the basis for global thinking and practices, including in medical education. Political analysis can help to expose and challenge such thinking. APPROACH: To better understand impacts of globalisation in medical education, we explore the previously under-examined political dimensions that underpin it, focusing particularly on deconstructing power relations. We situate our analysis of global medical education in political terms, including through examination of ideology, economics, market and the enduring effects of colonialism. We interrogate the construct of the Global South (GS), considering the geopolitical and historical ideas that have enabled it to be widely propagated. We go on to examine the consequences of the GS construct in medical education and consider what this tells us about how power is enacted in the field. CONCLUSIONS: In analysing the politics of global medical education, we shed light on how power is exerted and draw attention to forces that permit and enable trends, policies and positions. Notwithstanding the emancipatory rhetoric that has been associated with the GS construct, we highlight its reductive potential and argue that it can lead to an oversimplification of power relations and vested interests. Given the growing recognition that educational approaches do not transfer well across countries and cultures, we encourage the medical education community to consider why ideas from more dominant countries continue to be imitated so routinely. In doing so, we urge them to use political lenses to recognise the influence of multiple complex and interconnected forces of global power that shape all aspects of medical education.