”Vi kan ju sälja det övriga landet till hugade spekulanter”
Om tillhörighet, gemenskaper och handlingsmöjligheter i enförändrad ekonomi av
Susanna Lundberg
Akademisk avhandling
Avhandling för filosofie doktorsexamen i sociologi, som kommer att försvaras offentligt fredag den 5 februari 2016 kl. 13.15 Hörsal F Forumhuset, Örebro universitet Opponent: Docent Ylva Ulfsdotter Eriksson
Göteborgs Universitet
Örebro universitet
Institutionen för humaniora, utbildnings- och samhällsvetenskap
Abstract
Susanna Lundberg (2016) ”Let’s just sell off these backlands to whoever wants them” – On inclusion, communities and ranges of action
Örebro Studies in Sociology 20.
The purpose of this dissertation is to contribute to a deeper understanding of how the national community is reproduced and delineated in relation to class, gender and racialisation. It uses a qualitative methodology and interviews with people chosen to represent an economic margin, and is theoretically informed by Pierre Bourdieu, Beverly Skeggs and others. In interviewees’ accounts about work life and societal change, traces are found regarding how the national community is delineated, and how value for the community is claimed or denied.
The main findings are that a national community is connected through the idea of value for the community, and that the dominating ideas con-cerning this value change over time in accordance with economic, political and discursive processes. Recognition is a condition for access to the la-bour market and for the right to contribute to the future of the commu-nity. The values and the community are not homogenous; there is room for competing values and thus competing ways of recognition.
Those with less recognised resources get their value for the community questioned in relation to current hegemonic values. Adaptability to the needs of the labour market in terms of expectations of geographic flexi-bility and the right attitude are common demands that implicitly presumes economic and social resources.
Misrecognition of resources and value also relate to the social process of racialisation. Whiteness can be regarded as the result of recognised na-tional inclusion in a country such as Sweden where the ideal of light skin and blue eyes have gained hegemonic position through history. Class re-lations as well as male domination over women works through the same mechanisms of misrecognition and excluded experiences.
Keywords: Class, place, nationality, labour morality, inclusion/exclusion, community, whiteness, Swedishness
Susanna Lundberg, Institutionen för humaniora, utbildnings- och samhällsvetenskap. Örebro University, SE-701 82 Örebro, Sweden. susanna.lundberg@mah.se
