We need to reframe the approach to decolonising global health by centring the Global South as primary actor and leader, writes Muneera Rasheed
Calls to decolonise global health and tackle historic and systemic injustices in the field have intensified in recent years, but sometimes the way the argument is presented can be counterproductive.
For those of us in the Global South, the discourse can make us feel that our experiences are invalid. We are often portrayed as helpless and needing to be rescued,1 not by white saviours as in the past, but by well meaning actors in the Global North who are themselves struggling with the legacy of white supremacy, such as racism. This portrayal oversimplifies the power dynamics in the Global South. An essential element of coloniality is that it reproduces itself in colonised countries in the Global South by using incentives such as granting access to the decision makers in coloniser countries in the Global North. The current discourse overlooks thi