Borderline Welfare

by Cooper, Andrew; Lousada, Julian

• ISBN13: 9781855759053
• ISBN10: 1855759055
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2005-11-30
• Publisher: KARNAC BOOKS

Summary

Which "forms of feeling" are facilitated and which discouraged within the cultures and structures of modern state welfare? This book illuminates the social and psychic dynamics of these new public cultures of welfare, locating them in relation to our understanding of borderline states of mind in individuals, organizations, and society. Drawing upon their idea of a psychoanalytic sensibility rooted in Wilfred Bion's notion of "learning from experience", the authors aim to access the new structures of feeling now taking shape in commercialized and commodified health and social care systems. Integrating their reflections on clinical work with patients, consultancy with public sector organizations, political analysis, and the tradition of Group Relations Training, they offer a wide-ranging perspective on how contemporary social anxieties are managed within modern public welfare. Our collective struggle with fears of dependency and loss, and the demands of living and working in an inter-dependent "networked" world give rise to fresh challenges to our ability to maintain depth emotional engagements in welfare settings.

Author Biography

Julian Lousado is a Senior Clinical Lecturer in Social Work, and Clinical Director of the Adult Department of the Tavistock Clinic. Andrew Cooper is Professor of Social Work at the Tavistock Clinic and the University of East London.

Table of Contents

AUTHORS	vii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS	ix
SERIES EDITOR'S PREFACE	xi
CHAPTER ONE Introduction: the psychoanalytic study of welfare	1	(24)
CHAPTER TWO Borderline states of mind and society	25	(34)
CHAPTER THREE The state of mind we're in: sincerity, anxiety, and the audit society	59	(24)
CHAPTER FOUR The psychic geography of racism: the state, the clinician, and hatred of the stranger	83	(22)
CHAPTER FIVE The broken link: polemic and pain in mental health work	105	(20)
CHAPTER SIX Surface tensions: emotion, conflict, and the social containment of dangerous knowledge	125	(20)
CHAPTER SEVEN Surface and depth in the Victoria Climbie Inquiry Report: exploring emotionally intelligent policy	145	(26)
CHAPTER EIGHT The vanishing organization: organizational containment in a networked world	171	(18)
CHAPTER NINE Conclusion: Complex dependencies and the dilemmas of modern welfare	189	(16)
CHAPTER TEN Methodological reflections: clinical sensibility and the study of the social	205	(20)
REFERENCES	225	(8)
INDEX	233