The paper focuses on the role of the World Health Organization (WHO) in promoting a healthy world population as a generative and robust idea within health policy. The WHO’s health credo transcends national boundaries to promote health globally. It is embedded in norms, values, and standards promulgated by the organization and contributes in shaping the health responses of national governments. Ideational robustness refers to the ability of the WHO to adapt its health credo to changing contexts and circumstances, thus promoting the legitimacy of an international health order. Disturbances, including the Covid-19 pandemic, test the credo’s robustness, forcing the WHO to constantly work at reframing ideas to adapt to political forces and competing logics that structure the field of international health. Empirically, the paper is based on an historical analysis of the evolution of the health credo of the WHO since its inception. Qualitative content analysis of secondary sources, such as policy documents, explores how ideational work performed by WHO leaders impacts on the organization’s position and legitimacy. Ideational robustness appears to be largely influenced by leadership vision, preexisting organizational structure, and the political economy of international health. Ideational robustness appears as a powerful yet insufficient ingredient of policy success.

中文翻译：

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世界卫生组织作为理念稳健性的引擎

本文重点讨论了世界卫生组织 (WHO) 在促进世界人口健康方面所发挥的作用，将其作为卫生政策中的一个富有成效的、强有力的理念。世界卫生组织的健康信条超越国界，促进全球健康。它嵌入到该组织颁布的规范、价值观和标准中，并有助于制定各国政府的卫生应对措施。理念稳健性是指世界卫生组织根据不断变化的背景和情况调整其卫生信条，从而促进国际卫生秩序的合法性的能力。包括Covid-19大流行在内的动荡考验了这一信条的稳健性，迫使世卫组织不断努力重新构建理念，以适应构成国际卫生领域的政治力量和竞争逻辑。从经验上看，本文基于对世界卫生组织成立以来卫生信条演变的历史分析。对政策文件等二手来源的定性内容分析探讨了世卫组织领导人的构思工作如何影响该组织的地位和合法性。理念的稳健性似乎在很大程度上受到领导愿景、现有组织结构和国际卫生政治经济学的影响。理念的稳健性似乎是政策成功的一个强有力但还不够的因素。