Pub Date : 2020-08-09DOI: 10.1177/0791603520947655
Melissa Meyer
The questionable wisdom of Musk aside, the truth in these words tweeted at 8 a.m. to his 36.6 M followers is undeniable. The power memes can wield is both a tool and a toolbox. They have the potential to both depict and construct, and their value has been underestimated in sociology.A new breed of sociologists has risen, one who does not teach but tweet. They’re capturing, defining, and challenging a world no textbook prepared us for. Memes have become a language that socially constructs, rapidly evolves, responsively maintains, and reflexively challenges within social worlds that have adapted during the pandemic as people went online because they were not allowed to go out. In the chaos of the pandemic, these voices have offered insight, distillation, critique, relief, and, most importantly, meaning. Responding to our fundamental need for sociability, association, and imitation (Simmel and Hughes, 1949), memes have shown us modes of understanding that were relatable and imitative enough to foster a sense of camaraderie and certainty, at times even encouraging critical thinking, while everything else seemed liminal and adrift without a paddle.The purpose of this piece, however, is not to sing the praises of the language of my people. Instead, it aims to enlighten about how rich and powerful this toolbox can be to sociologists in understanding life during COVID. It also hopes to show how memers are stealing your jobs by becoming sociologists themselves. #truthbomb
{"title":"Thus spoke the internet: Social media sociologists and the importance of memeing in making meaning","authors":"Melissa Meyer","doi":"10.1177/0791603520947655","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0791603520947655","url":null,"abstract":"The questionable wisdom of Musk aside, the truth in these words tweeted at 8 a.m. to his 36.6 M followers is undeniable. The power memes can wield is both a tool and a toolbox. They have the potential to both depict and construct, and their value has been underestimated in sociology.A new breed of sociologists has risen, one who does not teach but tweet. They’re capturing, defining, and challenging a world no textbook prepared us for. Memes have become a language that socially constructs, rapidly evolves, responsively maintains, and reflexively challenges within social worlds that have adapted during the pandemic as people went online because they were not allowed to go out. In the chaos of the pandemic, these voices have offered insight, distillation, critique, relief, and, most importantly, meaning. Responding to our fundamental need for sociability, association, and imitation (Simmel and Hughes, 1949), memes have shown us modes of understanding that were relatable and imitative enough to foster a sense of camaraderie and certainty, at times even encouraging critical thinking, while everything else seemed liminal and adrift without a paddle.The purpose of this piece, however, is not to sing the praises of the language of my people. Instead, it aims to enlighten about how rich and powerful this toolbox can be to sociologists in understanding life during COVID. It also hopes to show how memers are stealing your jobs by becoming sociologists themselves. #truthbomb","PeriodicalId":52497,"journal":{"name":"Irish Journal of Sociology","volume":"29 1","pages":"118 - 123"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-08-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0791603520947655","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49405581","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-08-01DOI: 10.1177/0791603520945822
Sara O’Sullivan, Thomas U. Grund
{"title":"Editors’ introduction","authors":"Sara O’Sullivan, Thomas U. Grund","doi":"10.1177/0791603520945822","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0791603520945822","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":52497,"journal":{"name":"Irish Journal of Sociology","volume":"28 1","pages":"115 - 115"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0791603520945822","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45448300","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-07-23DOI: 10.1177/0791603520940941
Seán L'estrange
12 June 2020: Over the past couple of months there have been serious and sustained attempts by the vast majority of countries and territories across the world to “ramp up” Covid-19 testing capacity, improve efficiency and accuracy in testing, and test more widely and rapidly than heretofore. These efforts continue in many parts of the world, and combined with efforts to establish effective contact-tracing operations, they are essential to efforts to progressively relax “lockdown” restrictions in the weeks and months ahead so that some form of “normality” can be re-established in the wake of the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic. Yet even under tight and well-regulated social distancing protocols, new transmissions of Covid-19 will inevitably arise as interpersonal interactions increase and social contact chains begin to be restored. The role of testing within this regulated
{"title":"Testing Times: Viral surveillance and social control in post-lockdown societies","authors":"Seán L'estrange","doi":"10.1177/0791603520940941","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0791603520940941","url":null,"abstract":"12 June 2020: Over the past couple of months there have been serious and sustained attempts by the vast majority of countries and territories across the world to “ramp up” Covid-19 testing capacity, improve efficiency and accuracy in testing, and test more widely and rapidly than heretofore. These efforts continue in many parts of the world, and combined with efforts to establish effective contact-tracing operations, they are essential to efforts to progressively relax “lockdown” restrictions in the weeks and months ahead so that some form of “normality” can be re-established in the wake of the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic. Yet even under tight and well-regulated social distancing protocols, new transmissions of Covid-19 will inevitably arise as interpersonal interactions increase and social contact chains begin to be restored. The role of testing within this regulated","PeriodicalId":52497,"journal":{"name":"Irish Journal of Sociology","volume":"28 1","pages":"362 - 369"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-07-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0791603520940941","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48134962","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-07-22DOI: 10.1177/0791603520939794
Rosie Campbell, Lucy Smith, Becky Leacy, M. Ryan, Billie Stoica
The Republic of Ireland’s new Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act 2017 (2017 Act) criminalised sex purchase. Drawing on primary data from reports made by sex workers in Ireland to UglyMugs.ie, we analyse trends in violent and other crimes against sex workers in Republic of Ireland (hereafter Ireland). Examining the four-year period 2015–2019, we highlight the various crimes sex workers experience, including incidents of hate crime. Analysis of UglyMugs.ie data found that crimes (including violent offences) against sex workers increased following the introduction of the new law and continued with low levels of reporting of said crimes to the police. The data suggest that the 2017 Act heightens the risks for sex workers. Here, we advocate an intersectional framework to provide a more nuanced understanding of how sex workers in Ireland experience violent and other hate crimes (ICRSE, 2014). We suggest that considering the international research evidence, the most conducive framework in which to reduce violence against sex workers is that of full decriminalisation (Platt et al, 2018). But, as others have pointed out, that legal reform needs to be in tandem with other policies and a refocusing of police resources on sex worker safety, better enabling reporting and access to justice.
{"title":"Not collateral damage: Trends in violence and hate crimes experienced by sex workers in the Republic of Ireland","authors":"Rosie Campbell, Lucy Smith, Becky Leacy, M. Ryan, Billie Stoica","doi":"10.1177/0791603520939794","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0791603520939794","url":null,"abstract":"The Republic of Ireland’s new Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act 2017 (2017 Act) criminalised sex purchase. Drawing on primary data from reports made by sex workers in Ireland to UglyMugs.ie, we analyse trends in violent and other crimes against sex workers in Republic of Ireland (hereafter Ireland). Examining the four-year period 2015–2019, we highlight the various crimes sex workers experience, including incidents of hate crime. Analysis of UglyMugs.ie data found that crimes (including violent offences) against sex workers increased following the introduction of the new law and continued with low levels of reporting of said crimes to the police. The data suggest that the 2017 Act heightens the risks for sex workers. Here, we advocate an intersectional framework to provide a more nuanced understanding of how sex workers in Ireland experience violent and other hate crimes (ICRSE, 2014). We suggest that considering the international research evidence, the most conducive framework in which to reduce violence against sex workers is that of full decriminalisation (Platt et al, 2018). But, as others have pointed out, that legal reform needs to be in tandem with other policies and a refocusing of police resources on sex worker safety, better enabling reporting and access to justice.","PeriodicalId":52497,"journal":{"name":"Irish Journal of Sociology","volume":"28 1","pages":"280 - 313"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-07-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0791603520939794","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45634282","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-07-22DOI: 10.1177/0791603520944404
Rubén Flores, J. O’Brien
3 July 2020. Over the past months, the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has shaken societies around the world. The pandemic has highlighted the hierarchy of types of knowledge and disciplines, as the imperative of ‘flattening the curve’ has thrust medicine and epidemiology to the forefront of public attention. Sociology has been slower and less prominent in the response. This is problematic as there was, from the beginning, a pressing need to consider sociological factors, such as harms and costs linked with the social-psychological impact of social distancing, the suspending of involvement in many types of work and business, anxiety linked with responsibilities to enact new protocols, and how power and inequality have been key variables shaping the relative probability of infection. The health and social impacts of the pandemic are inextricable. As Ryan Nolan will argue in a subsequent issue, there is a feeling of going through an enormous ‘breaching experiment’ that has revealed the ethnomethods by which we conduct daily life. At a macro level, this crisis has pushed the concept of ‘society’ to the forefront of consciousness, breaking for a period the individualistic ideology of our era. In many polities, the pandemic has arguably led to a boost in trust and solidarity, in contrast to the blame and scapegoating that resulted from the previous
{"title":"Debates editors’ introduction: Sociological responses to Covid-19 (Part I)","authors":"Rubén Flores, J. O’Brien","doi":"10.1177/0791603520944404","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0791603520944404","url":null,"abstract":"3 July 2020. Over the past months, the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has shaken societies around the world. The pandemic has highlighted the hierarchy of types of knowledge and disciplines, as the imperative of ‘flattening the curve’ has thrust medicine and epidemiology to the forefront of public attention. Sociology has been slower and less prominent in the response. This is problematic as there was, from the beginning, a pressing need to consider sociological factors, such as harms and costs linked with the social-psychological impact of social distancing, the suspending of involvement in many types of work and business, anxiety linked with responsibilities to enact new protocols, and how power and inequality have been key variables shaping the relative probability of infection. The health and social impacts of the pandemic are inextricable. As Ryan Nolan will argue in a subsequent issue, there is a feeling of going through an enormous ‘breaching experiment’ that has revealed the ethnomethods by which we conduct daily life. At a macro level, this crisis has pushed the concept of ‘society’ to the forefront of consciousness, breaking for a period the individualistic ideology of our era. In many polities, the pandemic has arguably led to a boost in trust and solidarity, in contrast to the blame and scapegoating that resulted from the previous","PeriodicalId":52497,"journal":{"name":"Irish Journal of Sociology","volume":"28 1","pages":"218 - 219"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-07-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0791603520944404","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43642468","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-07-20DOI: 10.1177/0791603520942728
J. O’Brien
There was a great focus at present (with this article written in May 2020, during the middle of the first wave of the pandemic) on the disciplinary architecture that will envelop society as a result of the ‘state of exception’ that the COVID-19 Pandemic represents (Van den Berge, 2020), and the negative psycho-social effects of social distancing. However, in contrast to these alienating outcomes, outbreaks of disease have historically also resulted in greater sociability, making it worthwhile to examine the ‘Coronavirus Crisis’ in light of the great sociologist of sociability: Georg Simmel. Alongside new surveillance policies and practices of dividing and confining, and concerns over a collapse in subjective well-being that portents a mental health crisis, there is also a manifest democratic sense of togetherness, and a popular commitment to public health, and new rituals that undergird this. The cause in one sense is because pandemics make nonsense of Social Darwinism and social elites’ sense of exceptionalism. The poor may suffer most, but privilege does not provide a complete escape, making it clear that public health is the route to an individual’s well-being. President Trump’s politics of division, distilled in the phrase ‘the China virus’, is a constant of his political career, rather than something new caused by the changed times, and comic-macho politicians whose modus operandi is mock dominance rather than amicability have manifestly been the least
目前（本文撰写于2020年5月，第一波疫情期间），人们非常关注新冠肺炎疫情所代表的“例外状态”（Van den Berge，2020）以及社交距离的负面心理社会影响所导致的社会纪律架构。然而，与这些疏远的结果相反，疾病的爆发在历史上也带来了更大的社交能力，因此有必要根据伟大的社交社会学家格奥尔格·西梅尔来研究“冠状病毒危机”。除了新的监督政策和划分和限制的做法，以及对预示着心理健康危机的主观幸福感崩溃的担忧，还有一种明显的民主团结感，对公共卫生的普遍承诺，以及支撑这一点的新仪式。从某种意义上说，原因是流行病使社会达尔文主义和社会精英的例外主义意识变得无稽之谈。穷人可能遭受的痛苦最大，但特权并不能完全逃脱，这表明公共卫生是个人幸福的途径。特朗普总统的分裂政治，用“中国病毒”一词来提炼，是他政治生涯中的一种不变政治，而不是时代变化引起的新政治，而那些以模仿统治而非友好为工作方式的滑稽大男子主义政客显然是最不常见的
{"title":"The dialectic of alienation and sociability: A Simmelian reading of the pandemic","authors":"J. O’Brien","doi":"10.1177/0791603520942728","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0791603520942728","url":null,"abstract":"There was a great focus at present (with this article written in May 2020, during the middle of the first wave of the pandemic) on the disciplinary architecture that will envelop society as a result of the ‘state of exception’ that the COVID-19 Pandemic represents (Van den Berge, 2020), and the negative psycho-social effects of social distancing. However, in contrast to these alienating outcomes, outbreaks of disease have historically also resulted in greater sociability, making it worthwhile to examine the ‘Coronavirus Crisis’ in light of the great sociologist of sociability: Georg Simmel. Alongside new surveillance policies and practices of dividing and confining, and concerns over a collapse in subjective well-being that portents a mental health crisis, there is also a manifest democratic sense of togetherness, and a popular commitment to public health, and new rituals that undergird this. The cause in one sense is because pandemics make nonsense of Social Darwinism and social elites’ sense of exceptionalism. The poor may suffer most, but privilege does not provide a complete escape, making it clear that public health is the route to an individual’s well-being. President Trump’s politics of division, distilled in the phrase ‘the China virus’, is a constant of his political career, rather than something new caused by the changed times, and comic-macho politicians whose modus operandi is mock dominance rather than amicability have manifestly been the least","PeriodicalId":52497,"journal":{"name":"Irish Journal of Sociology","volume":"29 1","pages":"113 - 117"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-07-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0791603520942728","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42308885","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-07-20DOI: 10.1177/0791603520942681
Laura Doyle, J. O’Brien
Covid-19 has dramatically changed how services for people with disabilities operate in Ireland. Disability services over the past 150 years have gone through many transformations from support for people with disabilities through institutionalisation in large congregated settings to a more person-centred rights-based approach within services (Dukelow and Considine, 2018; McConkey et al., 2018). Since the 1990s, in light of how the global Disability Rights Movement discredited the medical model based approach, Ireland began another transformative period towards a more social model of service provision (Dukelow and Considine, 2018; Garcia Iriarte, 2016). The shift towards the social model of person-centred, rights-based approach evident in the policies and legislation has become even more pronounced in the 2010s (McConkey et al., 2018). Due to the pandemic, we are now in the midst of another transformative period, which is not only indicating long-term, major changes in the provision of services, but also uncovering the nature of the mode of delivery that has emerged of the past number of years. The changes that have stemmed from the social model’s response to the medical model of disability have been further developed by a rights-based approach, where the emphasis is on the achievement of efficiency, accountability and respect for the rights of service users. Underpinning this new philosophy is the Health Service Executive and the Health Information and Quality Authority who define how
{"title":"A cacophony of protocol: Disability services in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic","authors":"Laura Doyle, J. O’Brien","doi":"10.1177/0791603520942681","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0791603520942681","url":null,"abstract":"Covid-19 has dramatically changed how services for people with disabilities operate in Ireland. Disability services over the past 150 years have gone through many transformations from support for people with disabilities through institutionalisation in large congregated settings to a more person-centred rights-based approach within services (Dukelow and Considine, 2018; McConkey et al., 2018). Since the 1990s, in light of how the global Disability Rights Movement discredited the medical model based approach, Ireland began another transformative period towards a more social model of service provision (Dukelow and Considine, 2018; Garcia Iriarte, 2016). The shift towards the social model of person-centred, rights-based approach evident in the policies and legislation has become even more pronounced in the 2010s (McConkey et al., 2018). Due to the pandemic, we are now in the midst of another transformative period, which is not only indicating long-term, major changes in the provision of services, but also uncovering the nature of the mode of delivery that has emerged of the past number of years. The changes that have stemmed from the social model’s response to the medical model of disability have been further developed by a rights-based approach, where the emphasis is on the achievement of efficiency, accountability and respect for the rights of service users. Underpinning this new philosophy is the Health Service Executive and the Health Information and Quality Authority who define how","PeriodicalId":52497,"journal":{"name":"Irish Journal of Sociology","volume":"28 1","pages":"370 - 374"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-07-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0791603520942681","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45784898","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-07-19DOI: 10.1177/0791603520942043
J. Kirwan
After the 2008 crash, successive governments led by Fianna Fail and Fine Gael introduced austerity measures that set the backdrop for the 2020 election. Many people had become frustrated at the provision of public services and began to question its proficiency within the context of a rise in the cost of living (Carroll, 2020b; Leahy, 2020). A predicted two-horse race (between Fianna Fail and Fine Gael) at the latter stages of 2019 and the initial exclusion of Sinn Fein’s Mary-Lou McDonald from the leaders debate added to the monumental outcome whereby Sinn Fein had ‘won the popular vote’ (Carroll 2020a; Kelly, 2019; Ryan and McQuinn, 2020). Given the seeming repudiation of Fine Gael policies and leadership, it seemed as though Varadkar was effectively finished. Ireland had essentially ‘voted for change’–or at least shown its intent (Leahy, 2020)–but the desire for alternative government evaporated once the coronavirus had breached the barriers. Having addressed the country, shortly after the initial lockdown, the interim and previously relatively unpopular Taoiseach was, in the moment, reconstructed as capable, competent and empathetic regarding the understandable fear caused by the news of the pandemic (Doyle, 2020). The responses of parodied political figures such as Boris Johnson and Donald Trump perhaps further enhanced Varadkar’s global and local image after he
{"title":"The ‘Playing a Blinder’ myth and why we must not forget shortcomings in unprecedented times","authors":"J. Kirwan","doi":"10.1177/0791603520942043","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0791603520942043","url":null,"abstract":"After the 2008 crash, successive governments led by Fianna Fail and Fine Gael introduced austerity measures that set the backdrop for the 2020 election. Many people had become frustrated at the provision of public services and began to question its proficiency within the context of a rise in the cost of living (Carroll, 2020b; Leahy, 2020). A predicted two-horse race (between Fianna Fail and Fine Gael) at the latter stages of 2019 and the initial exclusion of Sinn Fein’s Mary-Lou McDonald from the leaders debate added to the monumental outcome whereby Sinn Fein had ‘won the popular vote’ (Carroll 2020a; Kelly, 2019; Ryan and McQuinn, 2020). Given the seeming repudiation of Fine Gael policies and leadership, it seemed as though Varadkar was effectively finished. Ireland had essentially ‘voted for change’–or at least shown its intent (Leahy, 2020)–but the desire for alternative government evaporated once the coronavirus had breached the barriers. Having addressed the country, shortly after the initial lockdown, the interim and previously relatively unpopular Taoiseach was, in the moment, reconstructed as capable, competent and empathetic regarding the understandable fear caused by the news of the pandemic (Doyle, 2020). The responses of parodied political figures such as Boris Johnson and Donald Trump perhaps further enhanced Varadkar’s global and local image after he","PeriodicalId":52497,"journal":{"name":"Irish Journal of Sociology","volume":"28 1","pages":"356 - 361"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-07-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0791603520942043","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46317612","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-07-14DOI: 10.1177/0791603520940967
Ryan Nolan
The Covid-19 pandemic has illuminated the stratification of society in every nation-state it has touched. The pandemic has unmasked the hidden systems of inequality that are lost in the mundanity of everyday life fracturing the veneer of capitalist meritocratic society. Just as Garfinkel (1984) devised breaching experiments to uncover the rules of everyday life, so too has Covid-19 breached the social world to expose the macro rules of social life, and their systems of stratification. However, the Covid-19 breaching experiment is plagued by more than just the illumination of these structures; the pandemic has also intensified the cumulative growth of societal inequality. Covid-19 is most fatal to individuals who already have underlying health conditions. However, as McNamara et al. (2017) demonstrate, lower socioeconomic groups are considerably more likely to suffer from these preventable or manageable health conditions, and hence are most at risk in the Covid-19 pandemic. It seems that we may all be in this together, but it is a simple fact that the most vulnerable groups will carry the burden of damage caused by the virus.
{"title":"‘We are all in this together!’ Covid-19 and the lie of solidarity","authors":"Ryan Nolan","doi":"10.1177/0791603520940967","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0791603520940967","url":null,"abstract":"The Covid-19 pandemic has illuminated the stratification of society in every nation-state it has touched. The pandemic has unmasked the hidden systems of inequality that are lost in the mundanity of everyday life fracturing the veneer of capitalist meritocratic society. Just as Garfinkel (1984) devised breaching experiments to uncover the rules of everyday life, so too has Covid-19 breached the social world to expose the macro rules of social life, and their systems of stratification. However, the Covid-19 breaching experiment is plagued by more than just the illumination of these structures; the pandemic has also intensified the cumulative growth of societal inequality. Covid-19 is most fatal to individuals who already have underlying health conditions. However, as McNamara et al. (2017) demonstrate, lower socioeconomic groups are considerably more likely to suffer from these preventable or manageable health conditions, and hence are most at risk in the Covid-19 pandemic. It seems that we may all be in this together, but it is a simple fact that the most vulnerable groups will carry the burden of damage caused by the virus.","PeriodicalId":52497,"journal":{"name":"Irish Journal of Sociology","volume":"29 1","pages":"102 - 106"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-07-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0791603520940967","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47105839","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-07-14DOI: 10.1177/0791603520937279
Leigh-Ann Sweeney, L. Taylor, M. Molcho
This research explores service providers’ views on the barriers that prevent women in the sex work industry in Ireland from accessing co-ordinated health services. A purposive sample of eight service providers in the field of women’s health and social care in the West of Ireland were selected and interviewed for this study. The service providers were asked about their perception of the barriers of sex workers accessing health and social care services. Using thematic analysis, three key themes were identified: (1) lack of knowledge of women’s involvement in sex work; (2) identified barriers to health services; and (3) legislative and policy barriers to providing supportive services. While the service providers acknowledged that they do not knowingly provide services for sex workers, they all recognise that some of their service users are at risk of, and potentially are, involved in sex work. Yet, they were able to identify some of the barriers sex workers face when accessing their services. All these barriers were the result to the services’ limited capacity to support women engaging in sex work. At the time of data collection, the legislative context meant that selling sex under certain conditions was outside the law. This study highlights the consequences that criminalisation can have on the health of sex workers and the need for a paradigm shift in existing health and social care services. In this paper, we propose that a social justice rather than a criminal justice approach has the potential to address sex workers’ right to access appropriate health care. This paper gives due recognition to marginalised women, and advocates for better provision of services for women in the sex industry, while considering the new legislation of 2017.
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