ABSTRACT:

In his 2015 book Pain: A Political History, Keith Wailoo demonstrates how a medicalized condition became central to defining party politics in the United States from World War II down to the present. Drawing on sources ranging from postwar Congressional hearings concerning the veteran welfare state to debates surrounding Rush Limbaugh's OxyContin addiction, Wailoo offers a fresh analysis of both U.S. political history and medical history, showing how today's highly polarized party system emerged in part from debates surrounding the existence and worth of pain, as well as its management.