1. Introduction. Objectives and purposes of the study -- 2. The importance of the political and the social in explaining mortality differentials among the countries of the OECD, 1950-1998 -- 3. Do social policies and political context matter for health in the United Kingdom? -- 4. Individual and contextual determinants of inequalities in health: the Italian case -- 5. Regional differences in trends in life expectancy and the influence of the political and socioeconomic contexts in Germany -- 6. Power relations and premature mortality in Spain's autonomous communities -- 7. Social differentials in the decline of infant mortality in Sweden in the twentieth century: the impact of politics and policy -- 8. Summary and conclusions of the study