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Why are the institutional injustice and the lack of fairness omnipresent in Serbia? A pragmatic assessment of plural orders of worth

Stefan Janković & Milena Toković (2021)

Sociologija, 63(2), pp. 236-261. Open access.

Abstract. Recent results from Round 9 of the European Social Survey (ESS) indicate that Serbia differs from other European countries in terms of justice and fairness. Whereas the Serbian people’s dissatisfaction relating to unjust income distribution, unfair employment chances and political institutions may not be surprising, these findings still raise a dozen questions. Situated within contemporary discussions on normativity in sociology and survey methodology, this paper aims to reassess the moral grammar of these judgments. By endorsing tenets of pragmatic sociology and its principal aim to recognize the plural modes of valuation and criticism and reflective capacities of social actors to judge and evaluate, this paper develops around few major points. First, we underline how most major approaches to axiology remain stuck in a co-determinist framework, thereby renewing a number of dualisms. Instead, we opt for a relational approach and further present how the theoretical model of Boltanski and Thevénot enables the locating of different assessments of worth. After setting our methodological framework against the “externalist” epistemology, we explore our key assumption that the above-mentioned high rates come as a problem of a feasible “truce” between the domestic regime and the civic polity, ruled by proclaimed legality, representativeness and impersonal character. We trace the problem of incorporating multiple arrangements as a problem of generality, by relating these to two layers of information acquired through the ESS. One involves the analysis of the domestic polity covering the household situation in terms of organization and unveiling the specific worth given to care and protection. Another layer is derived from regression analysis which affirms that the absence of fairness in civic polity correlates with a higher degree of worth given to the domestic one, but also that the latter situation depicts a deeper ontological puzzle about making a mild transition to the assumed “horizontality” of civic matters.

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Kritische Bewertungskompetenzen. Selbstbestimmtes Verbraucherhandeln in KI-gestützten IT-Infrastrukturen.

Critical evaluation skills. Self-directed consumer action in AI-enabled IT infrastructures.

Jörn Lamla (2021)

Online-Expertise

Auszug: „Die pragmatische Soziologie der Konventionen argumentiert ferner, dass sich – ähnlich wie Walzer (1992) behauptet – historisch eine Pluralität von Rechtfertigungsordnungen herausgebildet hat, die eine Vielzahl an Bewertungen robust absichern, so dass in den entsprechenden Situationen reflexive Rechtfertigungen oft gar nicht erforderlich sind. Allerdings sind nicht alle Situationen so klar, dass die Gültigkeit eines bestimmten Rechtfertigungsregisters – etwa des Leistungsprinzips, der familiären Verpflichtung, der kalkulierenden Nutzenmaximierung oder der übersinnlichen Gnade und Inspiration – fraglos hingenommen werden kann. Oft treten „kritische Momente“ (Boltanski/Thévenot 2011: 43) in der Praxis auf, in denen die Situation dann entweder durch kritische Reinigung geklärt werden muss, in denen Kritik aber auch zu einer kompromissförmigen Verknüpfung oder Veränderung von Bewertungsmaßstäben führen kann.“

Extract: “The pragmatic sociology of conventions further argues that, similar to Walzer’s (1992) claim, a plurality of justificatory orders has historically emerged that robustly secure a variety of valuations, so that reflexive justifications are often not even necessary in the corresponding situations. However, not all situations are so clear-cut that the validity of a particular justificatory register – such as the performance principle, family obligation, calculating utility maximization, or supernatural grace and inspiration – can be accepted without question. Often, “critical moments” (Boltanski/Thévenot 2011: 43) occur in practice, in which the situation must then either be clarified through critical purification, but in which criticism can also lead to a compromise linkage or change in evaluative standards.”

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Wider die Verunsicherung. Arbeitslosenkomitees in der Schweiz, 1975–2002

Against Uncertainty. Unemployment Committees in Switzerland, 1975-2002

Anina Zahn (2021)

PhD thesis. Zurich: Chronos. Open access.

About this book. 1975: Switzerland is in crisis. To deal with the rising unemployment figures, compulsory unemployment insurance is introduced. At the same time, self-organised groups of unemployed people emerge, calling themselves unemployment committees. They persistently protest against deteriorations in unemployment insurance, even in the subsequent crises of the 1980s and 1990s. This book tells the story of unemployment in a decisive transitional phase of industrial society from the perspective of those affected. What does social security mean for the unemployed? For a long time, welfare state history dealt with insurance and institutional developments. This is also the case with unemployment insurance. However, a history of unemployment cannot be written without the unemployed. Their relationship to the welfare state is therefore examined using the example of five unemployment committees in German-speaking and French-speaking Switzerland up to 2002. How did they interact with the authorities? What were their protests against? Their criticism: the welfare state not only provides security, it can also make people feel insecure. To counteract this, the unemployed joined forces, seized referendums and set up counselling centres, which themselves became part of social policy.

Auszug: “Um die Verschränkung zwischen Arbeitslosenkomitees, einer sozialkritischen Gruppierung und dem Sozialstaat zu analysieren, stütze ich mich auf die pragmatische Soziologie der Kritik. Entwickelt vom französischen Soziologen Luc Boltanski und anderen Sozialwissenschaftler*innen wie Laurent Thévenot und Eve Chiapello, liefert die Soziologie der Kritik Instrumente, um kritische Akteure zu erforschen.45 Dabei rückt sie die Akteurskompetenzen bei Disputen in den Fokus. Ich stütze mich hauptsächlich auf ein späteres Werk von Boltanski, «Soziologie und Sozialkritik», weil er dort die Kompetenzen von Akteuren betont und zugleich ihre Auseinandersetzungen im Zusammenspiel mit Institutionen analysiert. […] Das Ende der Vollbeschäftigung sei mit einem aufkommenden Dekonstruktionsprozess der Kategorie Arbeitslosigkeit verbunden, so jüngere Forschungsarbeiten. Die Verhinderung von Arbeitslosigkeit sei eines der Hauptanliegen der keynesianischen Interventionspolitik der Trente Glorieuses gewesen. Nach dem Ökonomen Jérôme Gautié verliert Arbeitslosigkeit als umfassende Kategorie angesichts multiplizierter Arbeits- und Armutsformen als Gegenstück der fordistischen Industriearbeit zunehmend an Sinn. Dies manifestiere sich in Diskussionen um Working Poor, neue Armut und Langzeitarbeitslosigkeit. Auch die Statistik greife diese individuelleren Situationen auf.  Darüber hinaus trage die Aktivierungspolitik zum Dekonstruktionsprozess bei. Der Ökonom Robert Salais fokussiert deshalb auf eine neue «soziale Wissenstechnologie», die seit Mitte der 1990er-Jahre normatives Denkmodell der Europäischen Union geworden sei. Es gehe nicht mehr um das soziale Ziel der Vollbeschäftigung, sondern um die Erhöhung der Beschäftigungsrate durch Anreize und Zwang. Beide Autoren fokussieren auf Umdeutungen der Kategorie mittels statistischer Kategorien und politischer Massnahmen. Nachfolgend soll die Sicht der Stellenlosen auf den Wandel von Arbeit und Nichtarbeit im Fokus stehen.“ (P. 19/251-252)

Extract: “To analyze the entanglement between unemployed committees, a socially critical group, and the welfare state, I draw on the pragmatic sociology of critique. Developed by French sociologist Luc Boltanski and other social scientists* such as Laurent Thévenot and Eve Chiapello, the sociology of critique provides tools to explore critical actors.45 In doing so, it focuses on actor competencies in disputes. I draw mainly on a later work by Boltanski, “Sociology and Social Criticism,” because there he emphasizes the competencies of actors while analyzing their disputes in interaction with institutions. […] The end of full employment is linked to an emerging deconstruction process of the category of unemployment, according to recent research. The prevention of unemployment had been one of the main concerns of the Keynesian intervention policy of the Trente Glorieuses. According to economist Jérôme Gautié, unemployment as a comprehensive category is increasingly losing meaning in the face of multiplied forms of work and poverty as a counterpart to Fordist industrial work. This manifests itself in discussions about the working poor, new poverty and long-term unemployment. Statistics are also picking up on these more individual situations.  Moreover, activation policies contribute to the deconstruction process. Economist Robert Salais therefore focuses on a new “social knowledge technology” that has become a normative model of thinking in the European Union since the mid-1990s. It is no longer about the social goal of full employment, but about increasing the employment rate through incentives and coercion. Both authors focus on reinterpretations of the category by means of statistical categories and political measures. In the following, the focus will be on the view of the unemployed on the change of work and non-work.” (P. 19/251-252)

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