Examines the rise of public health as a discipline and as an institution dedicated to monitoring and improving the health of specific populations. Studies key historical texts in the history of public health and medicine from Europe, Canada, and the United States, as well as European and American empires and colonies throughout the world. Emphasizes the importance of new techniques of state data gathering and analysis, including statistical methods, epidemiology, and state censuses. Considers how public health has increased state intervention in the daily lives of citizens and subjects and where and why resistance to these measures arose.