“It's not about good taste. It's about tastes good”: Bourdieu and Campbell's Soup…and Beyond

ABSTRACT

We begin with a general discussion of the ways in which the concept of taste has been treated, moving on to what is sometimes taken as a (if not the) controversy in the field. That controversy centers on the apparent differences between socio-political accounts (Bourdieu) and psychological—emotional accounts (Campbell) of taste. What we then show is that the distinction is just that: apparent, on the surface only. What it conceals is a more deep-seated agreement between the two schools about what it is to be a human subject. Here we take our cue from Foucault and Foucault scholarship (Hunter; Rose; Coveney) and make the argument that what appear to be “theories” of taste are, from a pragmatic point of view, in fact rhetorical exercises of the self akin to cookbooks, advertisements and TV cookery shows. This paper, then, problematizes the emergent field of taste studies and presages an approach beyond those predicated on an essentially Kantian version of human being. That approach takes its cue from ethnomethodological insights about techniques of ordinary practical actions and from Hannah Arendt's idea of the disclosure of the self as fundamental to social being.     

中国海洋软实力的提升途径研究

海洋软实力作为国家软实力在海洋方面的体现被提出之后,围绕海洋软实力的研究逐步展开.海洋软实力在海洋权益维护和海洋治理中有着举足轻重的作用,在对海洋软实力进行系统研究之前,有必要明确海洋软实力研究中的几个基本问题:海洋软实力的概念与内涵,海洋软实力提出的重要价值,我国海洋软实力的水平及测度,我国海洋软实力的提升途径.因为这些基本问题关系着海洋软实力研究的方向与可能达成的共识,厘清这些问题及其相互关系,有利于在深入研究的基础上,探索海洋软实力的提升途径.     

求助悖论：疾病众筹的社会经济地位差异

依托于移动互联网的疾病众筹平台改变了传统的疾病社会救助体系,疾病救助的发起方从政府和社会公益组织延展至亿万百姓,为社会底层获得紧急救助提供了新途径。本文利用我国某大型疾病众筹平台上1 930个求助案例,探究了疾病众筹目标达成的家庭社会经济地位差异。研究发现,家庭社会经济地位越高的病患,其众筹项目越可能被转发与捐赠、所筹善款总额和目标完成度也更高。中介效应分析表明,线下人际关系网络在上述关系中扮演着重要的中介角色,而以文案质量为代表的文化资本虽有助于众筹成效,但并非连接家庭社会经济地位与众筹效果的中介机制。进一步分析发现,当求助途径从基于熟人关系的微信圈子扩展至公共网络平台后,筹款效果的地位差异得以显著下降。     

The relevance of contemporary psychodynamic theories to teaching social work

Teaching and learning social work occurs within the context of relationships whereby instructors and students mutually learn with and from one another. This paper explores the relevance of contemporary psychoanalytic theories, specifically self psychology, intersubjectivity theory and relational theory, to teaching social work. The application of these theories reveals the need for instructors to attend to context, mutual and reciprocal interactions, multiple perspectives on reality, and disjunctions in the learning process.     

THE ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL DIMENSIONS OF THE NEW ECONOMY

The concept of the ‘new economy’, though increasingly used by the media, policy makers and scholars, remains elusive. Two main definitions (the popular and specialised) may be identified; and the dimensions of the ensuing debate clarified in terms of three key questions: Is there is something qualitatively different about recent trends in the economy? What are the main economic consequences said to result from this new economy? What are the main social consequences? Of particular importance for social policy is that most models of the new economy suggest that it has led to an increase in inequality and social exclusion for those not positioned to take advantage of its supposed benefits. With most discussion focussed on a narrow use of the term — to do with communications technology — greater attention should be given to a broader definition which examines its consequences for the disadvantaged.     

Merleau-Ponty and Nagarjuna – Ethics Within the Self of the No-Self

This essay explores the concept of the self in the philosophies of Nagarjuna and Merleau-Ponty by examining how it is that, according to them, the self is empty and only conventionally real rather than intrinsically so. By analyzing the similarities between their philosophies, the essay aims to shed light on new ways of understanding perception, ethics, and our relationships with others. It will include an analysis of the no-self and the emptiness of entities, as well as an analysis of Merleau-Ponty's writings and philosophy to see how it is that, according to him, in order to better understand ourselves, we must understand the reality of our intersubjectivity and intertwining with the world. It will clearly be shown that Merleau-Ponty's existential phenomenology and the Madhyamikan school of thought coincide and offer powerful moral philosophies, while seeing the world as being completely separate from the self, distorts both our notions of ourselves and the world we are interconnected with. Virtue must be sought in samsara (perpetually being born into the world) and sunyata (emptiness that is itself empty of inherent existence), for samsara and nirvana (the end of karma) are one. [Correction added on 03 April 2023, after the first online publication: First two sentences of the Abstract have been modified.]     

The Smith College Program in Psychiatric Social Work: A Pioneering Contribution to Veteran Mental Health

ABSTRACT

On 7 July 1918, 68 women arrived on the Smith College campus in Northampton, Massachusetts, to learn how to assist in the treatment of shell-shocked soldiers and veterans of the Great War. The Training School of Psychiatric Social Work was the first academic program organized to teach mental health professionals about what today is called posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and to equip them to treat those suffering from it. This essay addresses three questions about this program: How and why did the Smith College Training School of Psychiatric Social Work come into being? What was the experience of those who taught and learned there? What effect did the Training School have on the treatment of PTSD in the postwar years?     

For the child's sake: parents and social workers discuss conflict-filled parental relations after divorce

After a divorce, the former partners have to form new relationships between themselves as parents, and with their children. What does this reconstruction involve? What are the tasks facing the parents? What are the areas of conflict? This paper attempts to answer these questions. Eight initial sessions of parental mediation were chosen for the analysis. The analysis indicates that statements about the ways in which parents are entitled to their children, and vice versa, are common denominators for the transition from nuclear family parenting to post‐nuclear family parenting. In the sessions, parents dealt with this duty by fighting a battle for a place in the children’s lives. The battles were expressed in negotiations about time and place. The analysis revealed two different solutions to the problem of the parents’ entitlements. One was the creation of the homogeneous family, with one parent and the children living together in a close relationship, giving the other parent visiting rights. The other was to form a heterogeneous family, based on the idea that it is possible to build a childhood on differences and dissimilarities. Most of the conflicts originated from parents’ efforts to create homogeneous families.     

Academic writing in social work education: reflections from an international classroom

The affordances of processing subject knowledge through academic writing are rarely explicitly realised in social work education. In this article, we highlight the link between instructors’ efforts to facilitate students’ academic writing and students’ perceived increase of knowledge in the subject of social work in an international context. Based on instructors’ and students’ reflections collected before, during, and after a course, we aimed to answer the following questions: in what way can academic writing support students’ learning in social work? What are students’ reflections on the pedagogical model involving academic writing? The theoretical framework for the analysis was based on learning theories focusing on collaborative learning. The main conclusion is that the instructors’ awareness of how to scaffold students’ ability to write in an academic context and to develop the students’ understanding of social work in a local and global context is an important factor in student learning.     

Need, allocation and justice — on priorities in the social services

Cuts in public spending and financial constraints faced by Swedish municipalities have led to an increased interest in issues concerning priorities. This interest reflects a practical need to meet current rationing with accurate allocative decisions, where the interests of different areas and categories of users are dealt with in a well-considered way. In social work, these needs today are obvious. The article raises issues concerning priorities with relevance for social work in the Swedish social services. The purpose is to develop a conceptual and theoretical framework regarding how priorities on different levels of decision-making are made, where the main focus is on different principles as grounds for and forms of prioritizing. Central are the following questions: What actors can be identified in the process of shaping priorities in social work? What are the principles behind allocative decisions made on different levels of the municipal organization? Which categories of potential and actual users gain advantages or suffer disadvantages from different allocative principles? A theoretical division into first- and second-order decisions and of allocations from notions of efficiency, justice and self-interest offer the main structure for the article. First-order decisions are political decision-making concerning the total amount of resources distributed to various sectors or programs. Second-order decisions deal with the issue of how to allocate given resources among claimants or possible users. Efficiency is discussed from the aspects of productivity, marginal utility and longterm effects. Material principles of justice dealt with are the principles of need, increment, contribution and merit. Self-interest is discussed in terms of self-serving bias, group-oriented interests and professional gain.     

The linkage effects of raw material processing in economic development: A survey of modeling and other approaches

Processing of primary raw materials has become an important and widely recommended strategy for economic development. Yet, even as the councils of many LDCs call for primary commodity producers to gain greater participation in downstream activities, there remain doubts on fundamental questions:What comparative advantage and what disadvantages do processing activities have in the LDCs?What linkages do processing activities offer?What is the potential contribution of processing to economic goal attainment in the LDCs?In this article we survey the material on processing, particularly with respect to modeling direct and indirect linkages between processing and the LDC economies. The article examines the following topics: (1) the literature on processing in economic development; (2) modeling processing linkages; and (3) outstanding questions regarding processing linkages.We focus on quantifiable linkages between the processing industry and the rest of the economy. There is also the possibility of other linkages, such as the development of entrepreneurship and management talent and technology, that are more difficult to quantify. It is important to distinguish between micro linkages, which refer to the direct impact on supplier and user sectors, and macro linkages, which include indirect general economic effects transmitted through government revenue and expenditures, the money supply, and foreign exchange availabilities.     

Populism: a major threat to democracy?

ABSTRACT

Unsurprisingly, given the surge in support for “populist” movements across the globe, there has been a resurgence of academic interest in the subject. Our aim in this volume is to explore some of the key issues in these contemporary debates. In this introduction, we focus upon five of the main questions raised in this literature: What is populism? What variants of it are there? How serious a problem is the rise of populism? Why has there been a rise in populism? And how can populism be addressed?     

Refining victims’ self‐reports on bullying: Assessing frequency,intensity, power imbalance,and goal‐directedness

Bullying can be differentiated from other types of peer aggression by four key characteristics: frequency, intensity, power imbalance, and goal‐directedness. Existing instruments, however, usually assess the presence of these characteristics implicitly. Can self‐report instruments be refined using additional questions that assess each characteristic? We examined (a) what proportion of children classified as victims by the commonly used Revised Olweus’ bully/victim questionnaire (BVQ) also experienced the characteristics of bullying, and (b) the extent to which the presence of the characteristics was associated with emotional (affect, school, and classroom well‐being), relational (friendship, defending), and social status (popularity, rejection) adjustment correlates among victims. Using data from 1,738 students (M_age = 10.6; grades 5–8), including 138 victims according to the BVQ, the results showed that 43.1% of the children who were classified as victims by BVQ experienced all the four characteristics of bullying. Frequency ratings of victimization did not capture experiences that involved a power imbalance. Victims who reported all four key characteristics had greater emotional, relational, and social status problems than victims who did not report all characteristics. Thus, researchers who focus on victimization for diagnostic and prevention purposes can enrich self‐report measurements of bullying victimization by adding questions that assess the characteristics explicitly.     

Social Capital in Urban China: Attitudinal and Behavioral Effects on Grassroots Self‐Government*

Objectives. Studies of Western settings, in general, argue that social capital, defined as a set of civic norms and social networks among ordinary citizens, nurtures democratic governance at various levels. Does such a social capital exist in a transitional society such as China? If so, what kind of role does social capital play in affecting individuals' attitudinal and behavioral orientations toward fledging grassroots self‐government in that society? This study is intended to answer these questions, which are crucial for our understanding of China's sociopolitical development as well as for the application of social capital theories in non‐Western societies. Methods. This study is based on the data collected from a representative survey conducted in an urban area in China in 2004. Results. The findings from this study indicate that social capital among urban residents was abundant, and it nurtured the grassroots self‐government system through residents' attitudinal and behavioral orientations toward the system. Conclusions. These findings have strong implications for the future of local democratic governance and applicability of social capital theories in China.     

A social welfare perspective of market‐oriented social enterprises

The article analyses market‐oriented social enterprises from a social welfare perspective, within the context of the innate conflict between business and welfare orientations. After defining the concept of market‐oriented social enterprises and presenting some successful examples on such entities that employ different marginalised populations, particularly people with disabilities, the article asks three interrelated questions: (i) What policy environment is needed to encourage the development of social enterprises? (ii) Given the innate tension between the social and economic objectives in social enterprises, what structural principles are needed to enable them to meet those dual objectives? Lastly, (iii) What intervention modalities are best suited to help individual participants in those frameworks? Answers to these questions are discussed within conceptual frameworks from the worlds of welfare and business that jointly provide a base for a social welfare rationale for market‐oriented social enterprises.     

Research Review: Sibling placement in foster care: a review of the evidence

This research review was undertaken to explore the current evidence pertaining to sibling placement in the foster care system. The review specifically addresses the following questions: (1) Which theories inform research on siblings in foster care? (2) Which designs and methodology are used to study brothers and sisters in out of home placement? (3) How do researchers define ‘siblings’ when investigating child placement? and (4) What are the findings of studies pertaining to siblings in the foster care system? This review suggests that incorporation of theory into research regarding siblings in foster care is quite limited. Additionally, few studies clearly state how siblings were identified and defined. A major strength of the research, however, is the diversity of design and methodology used. Overall, the evidence presented in this review strongly supports keeping sibling groups intact unless there is a compelling reason for separate placements.     

Acceptance of empirical statements: A Bayesian theory without cognitive utilities

What criteria should we use in deciding whether to accept any empirical statement as being true? A popular theory suggests that we should assign subjective probabilities to all possible statements representing alternative answers to any given question; and should assign cognitive utilities to acceptance and to nonacceptance of each statement in case it is true, and also in case it is false. Then, as to acceptance or nonacceptance of all these statements we should adopt that particular policy that would maximize our expected utility. This paper will propose an alternative Bayesian theory of acceptance for empirical statements, which will make no use of special cognitive utilities. It will be argued that the new theory will avoid the paradoxes created by some other theories of acceptance and will help us in resolving some important philosophical problems.     

Activation in the Austrian Social Assistance Scheme – Unproductive Pressure and Low Support

Activation is an essential part of social assistance schemes. This article provides an insight into the implementation of activation in the Austrian social assistance scheme by analyzing the work requirements and support offered in two provinces, Upper Austria and Styria. The main questions addressed include: Does social assistance require everyone to look for employment? What kind of requirements do social assistance offices set, what support do they offer and to whom? To what extent do those activation measures lead to a job search? The analysis draws on survey results for 1,071 claimants and recipients in the two provinces. It is shown that social assistance does not require all respondents to search for employment, and that activation actually depends on province as well as personal circumstances. Items are formed by identifying low and high conditionality in terms of support and pressure based on 11 questions. Current practice incorporates supportive forms of activation to a lesser degree than efforts to force people to find work, due to pressures from the caseworker. Although high conditionality is not found to affect the job search activity, the job search requirement itself fosters people's search for employment.     

Social Psychology,Consumer Culture and Neoliberal Political Economy

Consumer culture and neoliberal political economy are often viewed by social psychologists as topics reserved for anthropologists, economists, political scientists and sociologists. This paper takes an alternative view arguing that social psychology needs to better understand these two intertwined institutions as they can both challenge and provide a number of important insights into social psychological theories of self‐identity and their related concepts. These include personality traits, self‐esteem, social comparisons, self‐enhancement, impression management, self‐regulation and social identity. To illustrate, we examine how elements of consumer culture and neoliberal political economy intersect with social psychological concepts of self‐identity through three main topics: ‘the commodification of self‐identity’, ‘social categories, culture and power relations’ and the ‘governing of self‐regulating consumers’. In conclusion, we recommend a decommodified approach to research with the aim of producing social psychological knowledge that avoids becoming enmeshed with consumer culture and neoliberalism.     

Treatment Barriers to Social and Health Care Services from the Standpoint of Female Substance Users in Finland

Abstract

This qualitative study discusses barriers affecting female substance user’s treatment access to welfare services. The study consisted of seven group discussions and three individual meetings with 13 women in Helsinki, Finland. Institutional ethnography was used as the theoretical framework for the study. The research questions are: (a) What treatment barriers do women face?, (b) What reasons are there for them not receiving services?, and (c) How do the ruling relations coordinate women’s experiences? Women faced multiple barriers affecting their access to services. They could be interpreted as being: determined by the service system, such as a difficulty in meeting the various criteria in order to be granted access to services; determined by the lack of trust; or determined by personal choices. The study suggests that the service system should be organized according to the needs of the service users. Future research is needed to address the questions such as how social and health care services could better co-operate, and how the different sectors of the service system could break down the institutional barriers.