Seminar: Tactics of participation
On 21 October 2024 Dr. Linda Haapajärvi (University of Tampere) will be the first speaker of the new Welfare Futures seminar series. She will hold a talk entitled: "Tactics of participation. Immigrant women and the pursuit of meaningful moral projects in the precarious welfare landscapes of Paris and Helsinki.
As participatory methods of welfare policy proliferate in Europe, it has become urgent to understand the reactions they provoke in their target publics. While the elaborate techniques of relational governance welfare professionals have developed to turn supposedly passive individuals into active members of their local communities are well documented, the uses marginalized individuals make of such top-down interventions remain a poorly understood issue.
Based on an ethnographic study of participatory integration measures targeting immigrant women in Paris and Helsinki, this article analyses how the women themselves weave these policies into their everyday life in local contexts where other welfare resources are not readily available. Drawing on Michel de Certeau’s analyses of “second production”, I propose the concept “tactics of participation” to capture how immigrant women pursue moral projects that matter for them – sustaining a positive sense of oneself, accessing money, jobs, and social support – by means of policy interventions crafted for other finalities, namely the creation of empowered, locally engaged citizens and safe and cohesive communities.
This research highlights how the analysis of tactics of participation can be used to gain a better understanding of welfare recipients’ perceptions of viable and valuable futures and what hinders their realization. It also stresses the importance of considering the tactics’ structurally precarious nature, rooted in the power welfare professionals wield over the definition of what counts as ‘good’ participation and citizenship.
What Tactics of Particapation, talk by Dr. Linda Haapajärvi
When 15.30-17.00, followed by drinks in the CREA café
Where REC B5.12, Common Room Anthropology, Roeterseiland Campus, University of Amsterdam, B-building, 5th floor
If you are not able to join in person, you can also follow the talk and discussion via a live stream (with the option to pose a question in the chat).
Please let us know if you are planning to attend, either in person or online.
The link also includes the option to receive updates for those who cannot attend but would like to be kept informed.