831.4
Exploring Ontological Models and Forms of Exclusion in the Field of Psychiatry
Pia Ringø, PhD, Assistant Professor. Department of Sociology and Social Work, Aalborg University
The presentation takes its starting point in an ongoing research project: ”Views of Human Nature in Social Work – welfare policies, technologies, and knowledge of man, AAU” (www.menneskesyn.aau.dk). A part of the project deals with the historical development in the relation between welfare policies I Denmark, scientific knowledge and diagnostic tools and presents an analytical use of what I define as ontological models (Ringø et.al 2017). Ontological models, underpinned by the prevailing forms of knowledge of the time, represents ideas and understandings of the generative mechanisms of vulnerability and mental illness, which through history has led to different welfare political efforts and restructurings of our understandings and explanations of mental illness and the dialectics between man and society.
The presentation discusses the concept of ontological models as an approach to understand and explain the historical development in our knowledge about generative mechanisms and social determinants of mental illness. An analytical focus on how ontological models can be used as an analytic tool to identify the social factors or determinants for mental illness also points towards broader discussions about how welfare policies (and solidarity) becomes dependent on integrative knowledge about the structural, collective, biological, psychological and social mechanisms that generate or produce vulnerability and mental illness. In a relation between man and society.
References:
Behind political ideas of welfare and productivity (2017): Exploring ontological models and forms of exclusion. Ringø. P; Nissen. M. A; Fallov. M. A; Kjaerulff. J; Birk. R. In: Social Work and Society
Productive potentials or protected individuals? The concept of disability and mental illness in advanced welfare states (2017) Ringø, Pia; Høgsbro, Kjeld. In: Social work and research in advanced welfare states. Routledge