Social theory

About: Social theory is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 11421 publications have been published within this topic receiving 624898 citations.

What Constitutes Good ICTD Research

Abstract: The emerging aeld of research that examines the link between information and communication technology and socioeconomic development (ICTD) has been carried forward by researchers mapping methods from their home disciplines onto this new terrain. With this journal logging six years of history (Best & Bar, 2003) and with the third International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies and Development (Dias et al., 2009) behind us, we have arrived at a point where it is worth taking stock of the distinctive challenges we have encountered as a research community. This article intends to propose some common criteria for identifying high-quality and promising research in the aeld, a signiacant challenge in itself, given the diverse range of disciplines involved—from engineering to public policy, from the social sciences to development theory. The seeds of this article were planted in an exchange on a mailing list between its two authors over what standards were truly applicable across disciplinary and methodological distinctions (Toyama & Burrell, 2008). Despite our initial disagreements, we believe that an understanding of interdisciplinary commonalities and differences will inform how ICTD researchers conduct research, how authors write research papers, how they are reviewed, and how conferences and journals select those for publication. Some of these activities require collaboration or evaluation of work across disciplines, and an explicit recognition of their paradigmatic differences could help build bridges between disciplines by allowing disagreements to remain as such. Given the nature of the topic, some disclaimers are in order. First, we emphasize that the ideas put forth in this article will naturally reoect its authors’ particular educational backgrounds, research experiences, and personal perspectives. Burrell’s formal background is in computer science and sociology; Toyama’s in physics and computer science. Thus, our comments apply primarily to what we believe can be said about the disciplines of engineering (including computer science and the various engineering disciplines), the qualitative social sciences (including some, but not all, of anthropology, sociology, etc.), the quantitative social sciences (including some, but not all, of economics, public health, etc.), and aelds with mixed methodologies drawn from the above (including information science, communications research, etc.). Although we have made an attempt to think through what is important in other disciplines (e.g., social theory, public policy), we refrain from claiming to speak for them. With this in mind, we hope that readers will be persuaded by the arguments we present. As with any aeld of study, what work constitutes ICTD and how quality is judged remain open questions to be determined by the community as a whole. It’s a cause for celebration, on the one hand, that such a varied group of people should unite in the quest to understand how technology inter-

Welfare Reform and Sexual Regulation

Abstract: Inspired by the political interventions of feminist women of color and Foucauldian social theory, Anna Marie Smith explores the scope and structure of the child support enforcement, family cap, marriage promotion, and abstinence education measures that are embedded within contemporary United States welfare policy. Presenting original legal research and drawing from historical sources, social theory, and normative frameworks, the author argues that these measures violate the rights of poor mothers. Drawing on several historical precedents the author shows that welfare policy has consistently constructed the sexual conduct of the racialized poor mother as one of its primary disciplinary targets. The book concludes with a vigorous and detailed critique of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's support for welfare reform law and an outline of a progressive feminist approach to poverty policy.

Classical Social Theory and the Origins of Modern Sociology

Abstract: My aims in this essay are both iconoclastic and constructive. An iconoclast, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, is a ‘breaker of images’, ‘one who assails cherished beliefs’. I begin by taking to task a series of widely held views, relating above all to Durkheim’s writings, of the past development of social theory. These views, as I have tried to show elsewhere,1 are myths; here I try not so much to shatter their images of the intellectual origins of sociology as to show that they are like reflections in a hall of distorting mirrors. I do not, however, propose to analyse the development of classical nineteenth- and early twentieth-century social theory for its own sake alone, but wish to draw out some implications for problems of sociology today.

“Successful Aging,” Gerontological Theory and Neoliberalism: A Qualitative Critique

Abstract: This article is a critique of the successful aging (SA) paradigm as described in the Rowe and Kahn book, Successful Aging (1998). The major point of this article is that two key ideas in the book may be understood as consonant with neoliberalism, a social perspective that came into international prominence at the same time the SA paradigm was initially promoted. These two key ideas are (a) the emphasis on individual social action applied to the nature of the aging experience and (b) the failure to provide a detailed policy agenda for the social and cultural change being promoted and, particularly, for older adults who may be left behind by the approach to change the book suggests. The article provides no evidence for a direct connection between SA and neoliberalism, but rather shows how similarities in their approaches to social change characterize both of them. In sum, the article shows (a) how the implicit social theory developed in the book, in a manner similar to neoliberalism, elevates the individual as the main source of any changes that must accompany the SA paradigm and (b) the focus on SA as individual action does not provide for those older adults who do not or will not age “successfully.” This, we conclude, implicitly sets up a two-class system of older adults, which may not be an optimal means of addressing the needs of all older adults. The article also reviews a number of studies about SA and shows how these, too, may emphasize its similarities to neoliberalism and other issues that the SA paradigm does not adequately address.

From Cultural to Structural Competency—Training Psychiatry Residents to Act on Social Determinants of Health and Institutional Racism

Abstract: Reckoning With Social Threats to Mental Health Psychiatrists in training launch their careers in a time of inequalities and structural barriers to their patients’ health. Many believe that the uncertain funding and regulation of the US health care system and a frayed social safety net have led to a crisis in mental health care. The United States has fewer mental hospital beds per capita than almost all peer countries, while US suicide rates are at a historic high.1 Prisons and jails have become the largest provider of “care” of those with severe mental illness. Systemic violence and discrimination based on race, ethnicity, religion, sex, and sexual orientation have increased.2 These broader forces not only likely contribute to psychiatric disorders but also make living with these disorders significantly more difficult.3 Over the last 50 years, psychiatric training and education have incorporated the revolution in the neurosciences. At the same time, psychiatric education has paid little attention to the powerful social determinants of mental health, which call on us to rigorously train our residents to understand and work at systems levels to eliminate the structural causes of illness. While cultural competency initiatives train residents in beliefs and behaviors of patient groups that experience health inequalities, cultural competency often falls short of systemic intervention. As a result, psychiatrists may not have the tools to improve their patients’ outcomes, which may lead to professional burnout, departure from clinical practice, and severe shortages of psychiatrists in the public sector.4 As psychiatrists also trained in the social sciences, we have adopted what we call a structural competency approach5 in training residents in US programs to address the social determinants of mental illness. The approach builds on a rich tradition of social and community psychiatry in the United States by specifying competencies for clinical training based on the following 3 fundamental principles: (1) understanding patients’ experiences of illness in the context of structural factors (eg, unstable housing and violent neighborhoods leading to anxiety and trauma-related disorders), (2) intervening to address structural factors at institutional levels (eg, to work with community groups to promote recovery, to collaborate with schools and law enforcement to divert symptomatic people from arrest to clinical care, or to testify to city and state legislatures on the association between housing availability and mental health), and (3) developing community connectivity and structural humility, a posture of collaboration with community leaders and with other disciplines and of patience with the slow pace of structural change. These competencies are critically important for improving mental health outcomes for patients who are socially marginalized by virtue of their race, ethnicity, sexual identity, socioeconomic status, and where they live and work. Structural factors, such as inequalities in law enforcement, housing, education, access to health care, and other resources, ultimately shape the ways in which individuals experience and recover from illness. The term structural brings into focus institutions and policies that can be altered to promote health equity, while competency signals that there are tangible skills clinicians should acquire to address the social structure factors that act as barriers to improved mental health outcomes. Because physicians learn through practice, this shift in focus from individuals to institutions requires bridging the gap between the literature documenting social determinants of health and clinical strategies to rectify them.