The politics of the face: the scopic regime and the (un-)masking of the political subject

Face is commonly seen as a feature exclusive to each person. It expresses subject’s feelings, thoughts and in turn represents knowledge that is otherwise deemed personal. However, face is mistakenly seen as pure expression of subject’s thoughts. This article aims to show that face is a product of governing practices of seeing and knowing. It is thus not a unique individual expression, but a mask that the socio-political order attaches to individuals as they are turned into political subjects. The article begins with a discussion of the two governing practices: the seeing (or the spectre of the visible) and the knowing (or the practice of locating faces in the socio-political field) with an aim to unveil the role face plays in the socio-political reality. The first interrogation looks at how face creates a field of recognition and opens a distinct form of political visibility: who, what and how one sees and what remains unseen. Whereas the second interrogation discusses how appearances produce meaning and how knowledge is taken off the face. Finally, the face as a knowledge producer and a mean of subject’s social recognition (identity) is put in the encounter with the idea of the anxious gaze and the work of Marlene Dumas. Instead of recognition, here a subject is met with dissociation and displacement of subject’s socio-political image. The three presented studies paint the politics of the face as an obscene governing strategy caught between endless attempts to create the face as a known, seen and governed space and illusive attempts to grasp the actual meaning of a pre-symbolised face.     

Quality of Life and Leisure Activities: How do Leisure Activities Contribute to Subjective Well-Being?

The quality of life is determined with objective factors and also with subjective perception of factors which influence human life. Leisure activities play a very important role in subjective well-being because they provide opportunities to meet life values and needs. Through participation in leisure activities people build social relationships, feel positive emotions, acquire additional skills and knowledge, and therefore improve their quality of life. In this report we will explore how leisure activities improve subjective well-being. We will try to distinguish among different types of leisure activities and find those which contribute more to the subjective well-being. Particularly, we will explore which leisure activities contribute to the subjective well-being of women and men of different age. Our study is based on data from a representative sample of Croatian citizens (N = 4,000), who estimated their subjective well-being and participation in various leisure activities. First, we will describe the subjective well-being of various groups of people who differ by gender and age. Afterward, we will identify important leisure activities which determine subjective well-being across age and gender groups. Overall, our results show that engagement in leisure activities contributes to subjective well being, while the pattern of important leisure activities somewhat varies across different age and gender groups.     

Maze of Resistance: Crowd,Space and the Politics of Resisting Subjectivity

Abstract

In 1968 the streets around the world saw a rise of a mass political movements. Nowadays, 46 years later, a nostalgic revolutionary aura surrounds that time; as since, such is the impression, the street is yet to emerge as a strong political actor or an effective practice of resistance is yet to take form. It seems as if the old ways of resistance have met their end, and new ways have not quite come in place. However, the most recent protests, as this paper aims to show, might have started a new path of resistance at the centre of which is a particular political subjectivity gaining its power from a space of resistance and appearing in a form of a ‘crowd’. By looking at the power of the crowd as a particular embodiment or a cross between a political subject and a multitude this paper explores the constituent power of political gatherings by rejecting race, ethnicity, religion, class or gender as their mobilizing force and instead focusing on the power of coming-together (common) in a particular space. The political capacity of such ‘common’ mobilising force was fully exposed in the recent protests across Europe and the Arab world (the two examples on which this paper draws). The paper opens with a discussion of the distinct relationship between the sovereign (or state) and political subjectivity. The constitutive moment of subjectivity (the self-other relation) is placed in a political context and by drawing on the examples of sans papiers and Bouazizi's act of self-immolation the difficulties of the act of resistance and their inherent and unavoidable violence are highlighted. These two recent acts of resistance expose the need to think political subjectivity otherwise, and point to vistas (the crowd), which can facilitate such a different thinking. By drawing on the constitutive idea of the common as logic of subjectivation the intricate relationship between the body and the political space as manifested in the most recent against austerity and oppressive political regimes protests is interrogated. In the hope of placing the political subject closer to the driving seat of politics a case is made for a rather distinct relationship between political subjectivity of the crowd and the emerging space of resistance. This is a relationship that amounts to a new ‘resisting political subjectivity’ and that can bring about a new way of engaging with the politics of oppression and begins to think political contestations otherwise.     

Health Self-management Among Older Prisoners: Current Understandings and Directions for Policy,Practice, and Research

The population of aging prisoners has increased significantly over the past several decades, resulting in concerns about the criminal justice system’s ability to address the needs of prisoners and parolees with chronic health conditions. This is troubling, given the health disparities among incarcerated populations. Health self-management has become a strategy within the community-based health care industry to improve health services and outcomes while reducing health care costs for nonincarcerated individuals with chronic conditions. However, to date little research has focused on the practice or promotion of health self-management among current and former incarcerated populations. This article highlights current understandings about chronic health self-management among older prisoners and parolees, with an emphasis on the potential benefits and current challenges in promoting their health self-management practices. Finally, specific recommendations are made for promoting health self-management for these populations through social work practice, policy advocacy, and research to achieve goals in improving health outcomes and reducing healthcare costs.     

Happiness and Pathways to Reach It: Dimension-Centred Versus Person-Centred Approach

The purpose of the present study was to explore the ways people achieve their happiness employing two approaches, i.e. a dimension-centred, focusing on the three orientations to happiness (orientation to pleasure, meaning, and engagement), and a person-centred, focusing on patterns of these three orientations within individuals. The predictive validity of individual orientations to happiness and their characteristic patterns for three aspects of subjective well-being was explored. Adult participants (N = 1,142; 33 % male) filled-in the Orientations to Happiness Questionnaire and the Mental Health Continuum-Long Form. Applying the dimension-centred approach, results suggested that all of the orientations represent possible and appropriate ways to achieve happiness. Person-centred analysis yielded four groups of individuals with similar profiles of ways towards happiness and membership of these groups was associated with individual’s well-being. Leading an empty life was associated with the poorest outcomes and full life with the highest well-being, with moderate well-being characterizing individuals pursuing pleasurable and meaningful life. More precisely, pleasurable life and meaningful life had relatively similar predictive value for psychological well-being but demonstrated discriminant validity for emotional and social well-being. This suggests that the profiles are meaningfully different and highlights the importance of the multiplicative influences of the three specific orientations to happiness.     

Service users’ involvement in social work education: focus on social change projects

ABSTRACT

This article presents and analyzes four projects focusing on diverse forms of service users’ involvement in social work training and research in different countries (Israel, Italy, Slovenia and UK). It highlights the value of service user involvement (SUI) to specific social change objectives and to social work education. The conceptual framework focused on the Standpoint Theory, while methodologically participatory action research was applied, and evaluation measures were developed. Key findings, facilitators and limitations to the involvement, students’ views of it and similarities and differences among the four projects are outlined. The challenges embedded in introducing and sustaining social change objectives in a co-production framework within social work education are identified, alongside the added value of meeting them. The differentiated impact the projects had on students is highlighted as well as their significance for health and social care providers were relevant. It is encouraging that in each project SUI was positively valued. The projects indicate the wide range of SUI in the content and format of social work education, as well as its applicability cross-culturally to a range of key issues pertaining to both training and research in social work.