Kawachi Named Next Chair of SHDH

Ichiro Kawachi has been named the next chair of the Department of Society, Human Development, and Health. Kawachi takes over from Lisa Berkman, who was appointed last fall to direct the Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies. Dean Barry R. Bloom made the announcement on March 26.

Kawachi, professor of social epidemiology, is a longtime member of the department and is director of the Harvard Center for Society and Health at the School. His research focuses on the social determinants of health disparities, such as the impact of neighborhood contexts on health behaviors and outcomes, and on the psychosocial risk factors for heart disease.

He came to HSPH in 1992 after receiving both his medical degree and PhD in epidemiology from the University of Otago, New Zealand. Kawachi is the author of more than 300 articles on the social and economic determinants of population health. He and Lisa Berkman co-edited the first textbook in the field, Social Epidemiology, published by Oxford University Press in 2000. Other books include The Health of Nations with Bruce Kennedy (The New Press, 2002), Neighborhoods and Health with Lisa Berkman (Oxford University Press, 2003), Globalization and Health with Sarah Wamala of the Swedish National Institute of Public Health (Oxford University Press, 2006), and Social Capital and Health (Springer, 2008) co-edited with S.V. Subramanian and Daniel Kim.

Kawachi has been a member of the MacArthur Research Network on Socioeconomic Status and Health since 1998. He currently serves as the senior editor (Social Epidemiology) of the international journal Social Science & Medicine, as well as an editor of the American Journal of Epidemiology. He has served as a consultant to the Pan American Health Organization/WHO and the World Bank. Most recently, he served as special advisor to the Measurement Knowledge Network of the WHO Commission on Social Determinants of Health.

In an e-mail to the School, Dean Bloom wrote: "As I wish Ichiro well, I also want to thank Lisa for the superb job she has done in developing the department during her 12-year tenure as chair. During that period, policy makers have become better persuaded through evidence of the weight of non-medical, social factors on the health of the nation. I have high hopes that Ichiro will continue SHDH's development and impact and lead the department to new achievements and distinction."

-Photo by Suzanne Camarata.