Craig R. Janes

Professor
Craig Janes.

Contact information

Office: LHN 2723

Phone: 519-888-4567, ext. 49149

Email: cjanes@uwaterloo.ca

Research interests

Dr. Janes is a medical anthropologist interested in and committed to social science approaches to public health and global health policy. Janes has research strengths in human-environment interactions, social inequities and health, global health governance, and maternal and child health.

From 2005-2008 he examined the impact of recent climate disasters on herding households in rural Mongolia and, with his former doctoral student Oyuntsetseg Chuluundorj, has recently completed a book on this topic.  His research with rural herders brought Janes in direct contact with the rapid scale-up of mining activities in Mongolia – many funded by Canadian investment – and the impact that these are having on rural communities. 

Since 2009 he has focused increasingly on assessing the public health impact of global resource extraction, in Mongolia and beyond.  He now works mainly at the policy level, specifically on issues related to public health governance of the resource sector.  His current projects in this area have focused on bringing health impact assessment concepts and methods into the extractive sector. In recognition of his many years of work in Mongolia, in 2011 he was awarded the “National Medal of Honour” by the Government of Mongolia for his contributions to developing the health sector, the highest award given to a non-national.

In addition to his work on mining and health, Janes has a broad theoretical interest in the association of global social and environmental changes with the emergence and outbreak of infectious zoonotic diseases.

Teaching interests

  • Global health, comparative health systems
  • Environmental change and health
  • Health consequences of extractive industry development
  • Health impact assessment

Education

BA Anthropology, University of California-San Diego

MA Anthropology, University of Colorado-Boulder

PhD Medical Anthropology, University of California-San Francisco & Berkeley

PDF Spatial Epidemiology, University of California-Berkeley

Selected publications (*supervisee)

Janes C, Chuluundorj O*, Making Disasters: Climate Change, Neoliberal Governance, and Livelihood Insecurity on the Mongolian Steppe, School for Advanced Research Press, Santa Fe, New Mexico. In Press.

Janes C, Bymabaa T*, Lkhagvasuren O*, Pfeiffer M, Sodnompil T, Davison C, Wagler M*, "Health impact assessment and sustainable development in the resource sector: managing the public health impacts of resource extraction in the

“Asian Eldorado,” IN Woodman, S. (ed.) Public Health Policy in Asia: Boundaries of Risk and Redistribution.  Routledge.

Allen RW , Gombojav E , Barkhasragchaa B , Byambaa T *, Lkhasuren O , Amram O , Takaro TK , Janes CR, "An assessment of air pollution and its attributable mortality in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia," Air Quality, Atmosphere, & Health, 6(1), 137-150.

Janes CR, Corbett KK , Jones JH , Trostle J, "Emerging infectious diseases: the role of social sciences," Lancet, 380(9857), 1884-1886.

Snyder J, Wagler M*, Lkhagvasuren O*, Laing L, Davison C, Janes C, "An equity tool for health impact assessments: Reflections from Mongolia,” Environmental Impact Assessment Review, 34, 83-91.

Hayden MH*, Uejio CK , Walker K , Ramberg F , Moreno R , Rosales C , Gameros M , Mearns LO , Zielinski-Gutierrez E , Janes CR, "Microclimate and human factors in the divergent ecology of Aedes aegypti along the Arizona, U.S./Sonora, MX border,” EcoHealth, 7(1), 64-77.

Janes CR, "Failed development and vulnerability to climate change in central Asia: implications for food security and health," Asia-Pacific Journal of Public Health 22(3 Suppl), 236S-245S.

Janes C, Corbett K, "Anthropology and global health," Annual Reviews of Anthropology, 38, 167-183.

Janes C, "Commentary: 'culture', cultural explanations, and causality," International Journal of Epidemiology, 35(2), 261-263.

Janes C, Chuluundorj O*, Hilliard C*, Rak K*, Janchiv K*, "Poor medicine for poor people? Assessing the impact of neoliberal reform on health care equity in a post-socialist context," Global Public Health, 1(1), 1-22

Selected professional activities and networks

National Coordinator and Sustaining Member, Canadian Coalition for Global Health Research

Member, Canadian Public Health Association

Member, Canadian Society for International Health

Sustaining Fellow, Society for Applied Anthropology

Member, American Anthropology Association

Member and former President (elected), Society for Medical Anthropology

Member, American Public Health Association

Some of my favourite reads...

Paton, Alan (1949), Cry, the Beloved Country.  Scribner.

Achebe, Chinua (1959), Things Fall Apart. Anchor Books.

Le Guin, Ursula (1969), The Left Hand of Darkness.  Ace.

Garrett, Laurie (1994), The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance. Penguin

Garrett, Laurie (2000), Betrayal of Trust: The Collapse of Global Public Health.  Hyperion.