Framing the Material Global: The Grounded Politics of HIV Testing Scale-Up

Abstract

Drawing on the framework of transnational materiality (Gille 2014), a conceptual contribution from the Framing the Global project, this article examines how HIV testing and counselling services became a site of political contestation in Taiwan since expanding service delivery was proposed as a response to the HIV epidemic by global health institutions in the 2000s. This global scheme, the study argues, not only reshaped the organization and practices of HIV service delivery, but also generated vulnerability as these practices connected to HIV-positive people's lives were largely governed by global models and national programs that may not fully reflect local concerns. In response, local NGO workers politicize service delivery in part by transnationally adopting and promoting practices that attend more carefully to localized forms of vulnerability. Using qualitative data collected in Taiwan, the analysis reveals a grounded politics of HIV service delivery that highlights the materialization of vulnerability and its management.