The Kindness of Strangers: Kinds and Politics in Classification Systems

Examines some medical classification systems with a long history--notably the "International Classification of Diseases (ICD)." States that this classification scheme retains many traces of its own administrative and organizational past in its current form. Suggests that ICD, like other large-scale classification systems, performs so effectively because these traces permit a coupling of classification scheme and organizational form. (Author/AEF)