Policy, Politics and the Collective
Projects and Publications
Engagements with health policy and practice
- 'Designing Out Fatness: The Built Environment in Anti-Obesity Policy' ESRC [Additional information]
Publications
- Atkinson, S. & Joyce, K. E. The place and practices of wellbeing in local governance. Environment and Planning C.2011;29:133-148 (Additional information) (View publication online)
- Atkinson, S., Macnaughton, J. & Scott, K. Dancing the Curriculum: a research report on the Dance and Learning Inspired (DALI) project. 2010. Download Report
- Evans, B. Anticipating fatness: childhood, affect and the pre-emptive 'war on obesity'. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers. 2010;35:21-38. [Additional information]
- Evans, B. 'Gluttony or sloth': critical geographies of bodies and morality in (anti)obesity policy. Area. 2006;38:259-267. [Additional information]
- Evans, J., Evans, B. & Rich, E. Eating Disorders and Comprehensive Ideals. Forum. 2002;44:59-65. [Additional information]
- Fleuret, S. & Atkinson, S. Wellbeing, health and geography: a critical review and research agenda. New Zealand Geographer. 2007;63:106-118. [Additional information] [View publication online]
This cluster draws together research in the Centre which attends to the politics of health, wellbeing and human flourishing. Central to this work is a concern with the ways in which rights and responsibilities are understood in relation to health and this, in turn, involves questioning the relationship between the individual and the collective (family, community, population) in conceptual, policy and practical work on wellbeing and human flourishing. Here, we engage with a range of critical theories, to analyse historical and contemporary forms of health care and medical practice. Attending to issues of policy, politics and collectivity also ensures the centre maintains an awareness of the politics of research itself and researchers within the centre are committed to challenging the elitism of academic practice through engaging directly with policymakers, community and ‘user’ groups, practitioners, and health activists.
- Engagements with health policy and practice: Research in the Centre involves critically engaging with policy and policy makers, both health policy and other policy agendas which are important for wellbeing and human flourishing (for example, sustainable communities policies). This work involves both empirical evaluation of policies and analysis of policy documents. Previous and current work includes: critical analysis of obesity policies in relation to education and urban design; analysis of the role of wellbeing within local authority sustainable community policies; evaluation of creative partnerships projects within schools; evaluation of dance projects within schools; and a wide range of policy recommendations concerning arts- and community-based practice. Click here to see examples of projects and publications
- Communities in/of health activism: As well as engagement with policy makers and practitioners, the Centre also works closely with groups who are involved in directly challenging health policy or who provide alternative forms of health practice. For example, researchers in the Centre work with fat activist groups and Health At Every Size (HAES) practitioners; with arts and health practitioners; with mental health service user groups; and with dancers. Click here to see examples of projects and publications
- Embodied Collectives: Through engagements with community groups and theoretical work which explores alternatives to the liberal individualism that has been at the centre of late 20th and early 21st century medicine and public health (particularly in the minority world), research in the Centre is exploring the importance of forms of embodied collectives to health, wellbeing and human flourishing. This involves exploring the role of communities within arts in health; and the ways in which intergenerational encounters might matter to a sense of wellbeing. Click here to see examples of projects and publications
- Biopolitics, governance and governmentality: Through critical analysis, research within the centre is exploring medical practice and health policy as a form of biopolitics. This involves a consideration of the ways in which particular forms of health govenernance and techniques of governmentality may reproduce unequal power relations between different bodies. The spatiotemporalities of notions of health, wellbeing and human flourishing are important here, and research here is contributing to recent debates surrounding the role of anticipated futures in forms of pre-emptive politics. This work is being done both in relation to contemporary health politics (surrounding obesity) and through historical work on birth, biopolitics and ageing in Hannah Arendt’s work and the abuse of medicine in Nazi Germany. Click here to see examples of projects and publications
Communities in/of health activism
- ESRC seminar series: Fat Studies and Health at Every Size[Additional information]
Publications
- White, M. "Are We There Yet? Towards International Exchange in Arts in Health," in Proving The Practice, Ed. Lewis A. 2008, Perth, DADAA.
Embodied collectives
- Colls, R. & Evans, B. Embodying responsibility: children's health and supermarket initiatives. Environment and Planning A.2008;40:615-631. [Additional information]
Biopolitics, governance and governmentality
- Evans, B. Anticipating fatness: childhood, affect and the pre-emptive 'war on obesity'. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers. 2010;35:21-38. [Additional information]
- Colls, R. & Evans, B. Critical Geographies of Fat/Bigness/Corpulence. Introduction: Questioning Obesity Politics. Antipode. 2009;41:1011-1020. [Additional information]
- Evans, B. & Colls, R. Measuring Fatness, Governing Bodies: The Spatialities of the Body Mass Index (BMI) in Anti-Obesity Politics. Antipode. 2009;41:1051-1083 [Additional information]
- Mack, M. “The Holocaust and Hannah Arendt’s philosophical critique of philosophy: Eichmann in Jerusalem”, New German Critique 106, Vol. 36, (No. 1 Winter 2009): 35-60.
- Mack, M. “Hannah Arendt''s philosophy of plurality: thinking and understanding and Eichmann in Jerusalem”, in D Celermajer, V Karalis and A Schaap, (eds.), Power, Judgment and Political Evil. In Conversation with Hannah Arendt, (London: Ashgate, 2010), pp. 6-25.
