Introduction

Abstract

Health promotion has long sought to define itself, and this has been an admirable, if futile, pursuit. It is not that there have been unsatisfactory definitions put forward over the years; it is, rather, that on careful scrutiny most fall short of describing the essence of health promotion as a field of study and practice. Most people in the field recognize the comprehensive nature of health promotion and the broad base of it practice. This, in turn, makes any short or simple definition seemingly impossible. Perhaps the field cannot be defined but left open to extensive explanations of its practice. Nonetheless, the seeming inability to clearly define the dimensions of such a major endeavor leaves many, and particularly the authors of this book, with a sense of frustration. As with most frustrations, one seeks to get to the underlying reasons for the difficulties and that is when one asks “deeper” questions about the origins and meaning of the field. That is why the two chief protagonists of this book (Kickbusch & McQueen) searched for solace in theory.