SUPERVISION FOR ADVOCACY: SUPPORTING SELF-CARE

The objective is to examine the intersection of advocacy for social change, the individual’s emotional costs of advocacy, and the use of trauma informed care in supervisory practice to encourage and support advocates and their work. Supervision models exist, but none address the needs of advocates who might become targets for scorn and persecution. The literature on trauma informed care provides a direction to improve the support and supervision of advocates, especially those who use their personal experiences as examples in their work. We reviewed data bases and relevant literature regarding supervision and the principles of trauma informed care. Periodical literature was reviewed for examples of those affected personally and professionally by their advocacy efforts. Review of the literature revealed little new knowledge on supervision but provided a base to apply the principles of trauma informed care to support and encourage advocacy for social change. This paper suggests the use of trauma informed care in supervisory relationships and advocacy work. This is an original approach to encourage and uphold advocates in difficult times.

GENDERIZING CONSEQUENCES OF FAMILY POLICIES IN POLAND IN 2010S: A SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE

The aim of this paper is to analyze four reforms introduced in the Polish family system in the 2010s. The reforms were introduced as an answer to a problem of very low fertility rates, as well as instruments helping women in achieving their work-life balance. The reforms are analyzed here in terms of their (de)genderization effects on Polish mothers and fathers. The use of a genderization-degenderization axis shows that the gendered division of domestic and care work is not challenged by the reforms, but it is rather reinforced by them. It is also doubtful if the reforms will manage to reverse current demographic trends.

THE DISUNITED STATES’ DECOUPLING FROM ITS FORLORN FOREIGN AFFAIRS’ ENTANGLEMENTS

The short-term ‘reign’ of the United States as leader of the world, policeman of the world, is being seriously challenged not only by pundits all over the world but by even political scientists and analysts in the United States itself. In fact, many are seriously opining that the United States is in decline—that it has lost its sense of direction, has taken itself too seriously, and has led the world for its own profit and well-being while disregarding the realities of other nations and peoples. The article attempts to trace the reasons for this sudden reversal of popularity of the DisUnited States of America.

RE-CLOSED BORDER AS AN EVERYDAY EXPERIENCE. EXPLORATORY RESEARCH OF POLISH-GERMAN TWIN CITIES IN THE FIRST MONTHS OF A COVID-19 PANDEMIC

Borders’ closure during the COVID-19 pandemic had a particular impact on the everyday life of borderland residents. As part of the research on bordering processes carried out since a few years, during the closure of the state borders in 2020, qualitative interviews on everyday life in the COVID-19 pandemic have been conducted. In this paper, we present the results of the exploratory study on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Polish-German border twin cities. We indicate at what levels borders’ closure affected the border landscape, border practices of the inhabitants of the researched territories, and their notion of the border. We also suggest how border relations were shaped due to differences in the management and perception of the pandemic situation in two countries. The results obtained indicate that the closure of borders has made life more difficult in an area under examination and has also affected the identity and specificity of the place. This issue is worth exploring further to establish the true extent of the impact of the pandemic in the borderlands.

TRADE UNIONS AND BASIC INCOME: SOME DANISH EXPERIENCES

Theoretically, there are many good arguments that unions should support a proposal on basic income. The main reason for the Danish trade unions resistance to basic income reform is that it would go against the short-term interest of the unions in organisational self-maintenance. Trade unions will lose power in relation to their members with a basic income. Trade unions have control over individual members by virtue of the collective agreement system and the labour law system. If you have a basic income system, the individual worker will decide when he or she wants to leave his workplace and strike. Suppose a single worker or a group of workers leave their workplace because of dissatisfaction with the working condition. In that case, they will be punished financially according to the rules of labour law rely on any support from their trade union.

GOOD AND BAD SOCIOLOGY: DOES TOPIC MODELLING MAKE A DIFFERENCE?

The changing social reality, which is increasingly digitally networked, requires new research methods capable of analysing large bodies of data (including textual data). This development poses a challenge for sociology, whose ambition is primarily to describe and explain social reality. As traditional sociological research methods focus on analysing relatively small data, the existential challenge of today involves the need to embrace new methods and techniques, which enable valuable insights into big volumes of data at speed. One such emerging area of investigation involves the application of Natural Language Processing and Machine-Learning to text mining, which allows for swift analyses of vast bodies of textual content. The paper’s main aim is to probe whether such a novel approach, namely, topic modelling based on Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) algorithm, can find meaningful applications within sociology and whether its adaptation makes sociology perform its tasks better. In order to outline the context of the applicability of LDA in the social sciences and humanities, an analysis of abstracts of articles published in journals indexed in Elsevier’s Scopus database on topic modelling was conducted. This study, based on 1,149 abstracts, showed not only the diversity of topics undertaken by researchers but helped to answer the question of whether sociology using topic modelling is “good” sociology in the sense that it provides opportunities for exploration of topic areas and data that would not otherwise be undertaken.

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BRAZIL?

Under Lula and Dilma, during the 2003-2013 decade that the World Bank called “the Golden Decade of Brazil”, we had simultaneously economic growth, social inclusion, environment protection and job expansion. With no deficit and very low inflation, and all despite the turbulence of the 2008 crisis. The onslaught on the inclusive policies started in 2014, Dilma was ousted through a thinly disguised coup in 2016, ex-president Lula was jailed for the time of the 2018 election, won by Jair Bolsonaro. Since the old oligarchies and corporate interests took over, the economy is stalled, unemployment has doubled, the Amazon is being cut down, child mortality is growing. The pandemic deepened an already general economic and social crisis. The aim of this paper is to present an overview of what went wrong, centering not on the pandemic itself, but on the deeper structural change that reversed the inclusive growth model of the popular governments. This involves the economy, but also technological, social and political change. The overall thesis is that inclusive development works, austerity does not.

FROM ‘POLITICAL ECONOMY’ TO ‘POLITICAL SOCIOLOGY’ OF THE CLIMATE CATASTROPHE: WHY THE ECONOMY NEEDS TO BE BLOWN UP TO BE BORN AGAIN?

The conceptual approach to real social phenomena and problems, as well as factors influencing and shaping them, although theoretical in nature, has momentous practical consequences. The issue of nature, and in a narrower sense of climate, constitutes a telling and representative example of the implications of the theoretical and methodological orientation adopted to study society and its relationship with the environment and its resources. This short paper aims to highlight the consequences of the shift in research perspective from ‘political economy’ to ‘political sociology’ in the context of climate change and its challenges. The article’s main argument is to outline the implications of the change of reference point for the conceptualisation and operationalisation of theoretical frameworks related to social problems and challenges, which, nota bene, are conditioned directly and indirectly by the state of the ecosystem. And the central thesis is that a fundamental reorientation towards nature and climate change within the dominant capitalist system will only be camouflaged maintenance of the status quo (accompanied noisily by a series of technological and fiscal solutions that solve nothing).

LESZEK KOCZANOWICZ, ANXIETY AND LUCIDITY: REFLECTIONS ON CULTURE IN TIMES OF UNREST

In the book entitled Anxiety and Lucidity. Reflections on Culture in Times of Unrest Leszek Koczanowicz reflects upon the phenomena of fear and anxiety in essential areas of life, both for the individual as well as the community. He adopts an interdisciplinary perspective so characteristic of an insightful researcher of culture. Fear and anxiety, as he argues, are intrinsic to modernity - the inability to get rid of them is characteristic of modern man. Koczanowicz puts his thoughts on paper in a demanding fashion, which does not, however, obscure the pleasure of reading these well-written and intelligent texts. The author's knowledge is vast, which transpires in the reviewed publication.

DEGROWTH, STEADY STATE AND CIRCULAR ECONOMIES: ALTERNATIVE DISCOURSES TO ECONOMIC GROWTH

Criticisms of the neoclassical economic framework and perpetual growth in GDP terms are not a new phenomenon, although recent years have seen increasing interest in alternative and ecological discourses including degrowth, steady-state and circular economics. Although these may initially appear as distinctly different discourses, they are highly compatible and comparable, sharing similar, often nearly identical principles and policy proposals. A more collaborative, joined-up approach aimed at integrating alternative discourses is required in order to build a coherent, credible, well-supported alternative, as there is more uniting than dividing these critical voices, particularly in the face of mainstream political and economic debates that are shaped by neoclassical economics.