"White writes critically and necessarily on the historical actions taken to prevent the spread of infectious disease. With great care, he deftly unpacks the racial and economic costs of global health initiatives and examines the ideals behind their genesis. The book is a remarkable and necessary re-thinking of medical history through the lens of 'epidemic orientalism'."—Hollie Sherwood-Martin, The Lancet Infectious Diseases "Over the course of his monograph, White successfully illustrates how an epidemic Orientalist worldview ultimately weakens epidemic responses and places the health of people on both sides of an imagined divide at a greater risk.... Historians and medical anthropologists and sociologists looking for a thoughtful synthesis of several intellectual frameworks for understanding medicine and empire will find Epidemic Orientalism a useful text."—Molly Walker, H-Sci-Med-Tech "Backed by archival, historical, and interview data, White pulls off an intellectual feat that places him next to Edward Said['s Orientalism]....Highly recommended."—T. Niazi, CHOICE "Alexandre White's brilliant book Epidemic Orientalism provides readers with essential context for understanding how social, political, and economic forces—including racism, xenophobia, and racial and colonial capitalism—animate modern epidemic disease control and pandemic governance. While White's analysis takes readers on a long historical tour through the architecture of international pandemic governance beginning in the nineteenth century, the themes that emerge from these earlier periods will be eerily familiar to contemporary readers grappling with Western governmental and international responses to the COVID-19 pandemic."—Courtney Boen, Sociology of Race and Ethnicity "Epidemic Orientalism stands out as a brilliant and timely intervention to not just ongoing discussions of epidemics, but also to the burgeoning studies of racism, racial capitalism, and (post-)colonialism from a global sociological perspective."—Sahan S. Karatasli, American Journal of Sociology
