The institutional foundations of medicalization: a comparative approach to medicalizing unemployment

In this study, we investigate whether the relation between unemployment and mental health care and antidepressant use, net of mental health status, varies across European countries and their unemployment and health care policies. We hypothesize that a combination of low levels of decommodification of unemployment with high levels of decommodification of health care will trigger medicalization of unemployment. A subsample of 36 306 working age respondents of the cross-national survey, the Eurobarometer round 64.4 (2005-2006) and 73.2 (2010), is used. Country-specific logistic regression and fixed-country effect analyses with cross-level interactions are performed. We find that the majority of the 24 nations, for which we have complete data, medicalize unemployment at least to some degree. As interesting, the variation in the extent of medicalization is substantial, and is, partly in line with our hypothesis, patterned by the combination of unemployment and healthcare decommodification degree.