Microsoft Word - v21n44_v2.docx Journal website: http://epaa.asu.edu/ojs/ Manuscript received: 12/27/2012 Facebook: /EPAAA Revisions received: 3/24/2013 Twitter: @epaa_aape Accepted: 3/24/2013 SPECIAL ISSUE Social Pedagogy in the 21st Century education policy analysis archives A peer-reviewed, independent, open access, multilingual journal Arizona State University Volume 21 Number 44 April 30th, 2013 ISSN 1068-2341 Dialectics instead of dichotomy: Perspectives on the twin ambitions movement Lisbeth Eriksson Linköping University Sweden Citation: Eriksson, L. (2013). Dialectics instead of dichotomy: Perspectives on the twin ambition of the disability movement. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 21(44). Retrieved [date], from http://epaa.asu.edu/ojs/article/view/1295 This article is part of EPAA/AAPE’s Special Issue on Social Pedagogy in the 21st Century, Guest Co-Edited by Daniel Schugurensky and Michael Silver. Abstract: This article discusses the mobilizing work of a disability organization, at the local chapter level. I have spent about a year following the work of a chapter, mainly through contacts, conversations and interviews with the persons who are active on its board. The analysis of the chapter’s work takes as its starting point two traditions that emphasize collective sense of community and mobilization of groups. These traditions, continental social pedagogy and Anglo-Saxon community development, are complemented by the theoretical concepts of recognition and redistribution. A number of dilemmas, which can be expressed in terms of dichotomies, are built into these theories. They can be challenged in different ways by the empirical data. Through these confrontations, we can see how the dichotomy is transformed into dialectics where phenomena cannot be regarded as either or but rather as both. Keywords: disability movement; continental social pedagogy; dialectics Dialéctica en lugar de dicotomías: Perspectivas sobre la doble ambición del movimiento por los discapacitados epaa aape E ducation Policy A nalysis A rchives V ol. 21 N o. 44 SPECIAL ISSUE 2 Resumen: En este artículo se analiza la labor de movilizar una organización de defensa de personas con necesidades especiales, a nivel de local. La autora pasó cerca de un año estudiando la organización, principalmente a través de contactos, conversaciones y entrevistas con las personas que están activas en su junta directiva. El análisis de los trabajos de la organización local toma como punto de partida dos tradiciones que enfatizan el sentido de comunidad y de movilización colectiva de los grupos. Estas dos tradiciones, la pedagogía social continental y la anglosajona de desarrollo de la comunidad, se complementan con los conceptos teóricos de reconocimiento y redistribución. Un número de dilemas, que se puede expresar en términos de dicotomías, se incorporan en estas teorías. Estas perspectivas pueden ser confrontadas por los datos empíricos. A través de estas confrontaciones, podemos ver cómo las dicotomía se transforma en dialéctica donde los fenómenos no pueden ser considerados como una u otro sino como existiendo simultáneamente. Palabras clave: movimento en defensa de los descapacitados; pedagogia social; dialéctica. Dialética em vez de dicotomias: Perspectivas sobre a dupla ambição do movimento defesa de pessoas com necessidades especiais Resumo: Este trabalho examina o trabalho de mobilizar uma organização de defesa para as pessoas com necessidades especiais, o nível local. Ela passou cerca de um ano estudando a organização, principalmente através de contatos, conversas e entrevistas com pessoas que são ativas no seu conselho. A análise do trabalho da organização local toma como ponto de partida duas tradições que enfatizam o sentido de comunidade e de mobilização coletiva dos grupos. Estas duas tradições, sociais pedagogia continentais e anglo desenvolvimento comunitário, complementada por conceitos teóricos de reconhecimento e de redistribuição. Uma série de dilemas, que pode ser expresso em termos de dicotomias, são incorporados nestas teorias. Estas perspectivas podem ser confrontados com dados empíricos. Através destas comparações, podemos ver como a dicotomia torna-se fenômenos dialéticos que não pode ser considerado como um lugar, mas como existindo simultaneamente. Palavras-chave: Movimento de defesa de pessoas com necessidades especiais; pedagogia social; dialética. Background This article discusses the mobilizing work of a disability organization (the Swedish Federation of People with Mobility Impairment, DHR) at the local chapter level. I have spent about a year following the work of a chapter, mainly through contacts, conversations and interviews with the persons who are active on its board. The analysis of the chapter’s work takes as its starting point in two theoretical concepts coined by Nancy Fraser: redistribution and recognition (Fraser, 2003a, 2003b). These concepts are in some sense completed by two traditions that emphasize collective sense of community and mobilization of groups (see Author 2006, Craig et al., 2008); community development and social pedagogy. A number of dilemmas, which can be expressed in terms of dichotomies, are embedded in these theories and traditions (see e.g. Berlak & Berlak, 1981). These dilemmas can be challenged in different ways by empirical data. Through these confrontations, we can see how the dichotomy is transformed into dialectics where phenomena cannot be regarded as either or but rather as both. DHR is, as mentioned before, an interest organization for persons with impaired mobility. On its website, it is described as being democratically, politically and religiously independent. Via its Dialectics instead of dichotomy 3 three levels, central, regional, and local, the organization works to create opinion and influence political decisions (ww.dhr.se). DHR has been a successful organization historically. It has been dominant in its field. Leading figures in the organization has had good contacts with ruling politicians. Subsequent years, however, the organization has declined both in numbers and in importance. Centrally, DHR initiates various campaigns that have an impact on the work of its members regionally and locally. This year, there have been various national campaigns. One of them, Öppna Sverige (Open Sweden), was aimed at making the general public and decision-makers as well as its own members aware of the widespread inaccessibility facing persons with impaired mobility. As mentioned above, the national campaigns impact on the work of the local chapters. The mobilizing work discussed in this article is part of “Öppna Sverige”. Recognition or redistribution? A relevant question concerning the disability movement is why it is necessary to bring about awareness and a liberation of the members in the organisation, i.e. a mobilisation work. This can be discussed taking Nancy Fraser’s distinction between redistribution and recognition as the starting point (Fraser, 2003a, 2003b). Today different groups struggle for cultural recognition of differences. It could be differences concerning sexuality, ethnicity or gender. It means that group identity has replaced class interest as the most important basis for mobilization of groups. It becomes more important to get recognition for, as an example, your sexual preferences than to get more equal distribution of the economic rescores in society. The solutions to injustice become cultural recognition instead of a socio economic redistribution. The goal for the political struggle has changed. Behind redistribution and recognition are, according to Fraser, two different perceptions of injustice. The first concerns socioeconomic injustice that could take the form of a person being refused work or other material resources, a situation that can be recognised by many people with mobility impairments who often feel that they are facing discrimination in working life. The second concerns a symbolic and cultural injustice, which has its roots in different patterns of interpretation and communication. A person is shown no respect or denied an equal status in interactions, in other words, non-recognition or misrecognition. This misrecognition has nothing to do with self- realization as for instance Taylor and Honneth argue for. Instead it is about relations of subordination that are in some way institutionalized (Fraser, 2003b). Discussions about non- recognition have often taken the experiences of different specific groups as their starting point. These are groups constructed and based on ethnicity, religion, gender, race, etc. This non- recognition and its consequences for the individual have also been discussed by e.g. Honnert (1995). According to Fraser, these two forms of injustice are intertwined. Fraser sees redistribution and recognition as solutions to these injustices. It is in these solutions that a dilemma can be discerned. Finding solutions to problems of a socioeconomic nature most often involves erasing the borders between different groups. The idea is that everybody should have the same rights, a form of universal thinking. Fraser thus argues that it can be seen as a dedifferentiation between groups (Fraser, 2003b; Young 1990). The solution to symbolic injustice should, on the other hand, affirm the group and group identity and benefit differentiation between groups, something that could be called a particularistic perspective (Young, 1990). The struggle for recognition of diversity can be said to have in part been manifested in the so-called identity politics where different groups fight for their specific needs and interests. Group identity forms the foundation instead of, as was previously the case, class interests (Fraser, 2003b). Philosophically redistribution and recognition have divergent provenances. Redistribution comes from the liberal tradition in which sophisticated theories of distributive justice have been developed by for instance E ducation Policy A nalysis A rchives V ol. 21 N o. 44 SPECIAL ISSUE 4 Rawls and Dworkin. Recognition on the other hand emanates from the phenomenology of consciousness. What they got in common is that they claim participatory parity. Recognition and redistribution can be regarded as analytical standpoints that are needed for a just situation to be created (Danemark & Coniavitis Gellerstedt, 2004). Both can be redressed in several different ways. To take redistribution as an example one can strive to remove economic impediments by organization of the division of labor, redistributing income or democratizing the rules for political decisions. The disability movement’s work can be, and has been, discussed on the basis of such reasoning and several researchers have used these concepts in order to analyze the situation of the disabled, but also to analyze e.g. refugees’ opportunities, above all in terms of social justice (Caroll & Rather, 2001; Danemark & Coniavitis Gellerstedt, 2004; Hupage & Marston, 2005; Jerlinder, Danemark, & Gill 2009). Transferred to the disability movement, the question is whether it should position itself as a special group with specific interests and needs or whether the borders with other groups should be erased – or is there an intermediate position? Another way of describing the disability movement is to say that it is in the middle of this dilemma between the universal and the particularistic. Groups that find themselves “in between” or whose reason for injustice are to be found both in the socioeconomically and the culturally are what Fraser calls bivalent collectives. Fraser advocates a combination of redistribution and recognition in order to create justice and she develops a critical recognition theory, a “two-dimensional conception of justice premised on the norm of participatory parity” (Fraser, 2003b, p 47). But at the same time she emphasizes that a dilemma arises when attempts are made to combat both these forms. Fraser advances her reasoning by introducing the concepts of affirmation and transformation which cut cross redistribution and recognition. I argue that these concepts may also be useful when analyzing DHR’s mobilizing work. Affirmation refers to a situation where attempts are made to remove injustices without affecting or changing underlying structures. This is, however, the case with transformation where injustices are removed by changing the underlying structures. The concepts focus thus different levels of injustice. The affirmative actions tend to reify collective identities instead of people’s self-understandings. The transformative strategies on the other hand recognize the complexity and try to restructure underlying social structures (Fraser, 2003a, 2003b). Both affirmative recognition and affirmative redistribution and transformative recognition and a transformative redistribution are possible scenarios according to Fraser. The solution Fraser advocates is a socialist economy (transformative redistribution) combined with a deconstructive cultural policy (transformative recognition). In my analysis below, I use these concepts to describe the mobilizing work of the local chapter. Two traditions with the collective community as their starting point The thoughts in two different traditions are used together with the concepts of recognition and redistribution to better understand the empirical data. One of these traditions is continental social pedagogy (SP) and the other is Anglo-Saxon oriented community development tradition (CD). These are traditions that have (at least) two different approaches, one conservative and one more radical. In this article, it is mainly the radical understanding that are used as a tool in the analysis. Social pedagogy is perhaps for many a vague or maybe totally unknown tradition (Eriksson, 2006a; Kornbeck & Rosendal Jensen, 2009) Also CD is perceived in this way (Craig et al., 2008). The history of social pedagogy has its roots in 19th century Germany (Eriksson, 2006a; Lorentz, 2008; Sünker & Braches-Chyrek, 2009). SP appeared as a reaction to the indivudal pedagogy and was focused on the attempts to find educational solutions to social problems (Hämäläinen, 2003). The addressed problems were linked to the processes of industrialization and urbanization (Sünker & Dialectics instead of dichotomy 5 Braches-Chyrek, 2009). SP has a collective dimension and a sense of community is an aim but also a precondition for SP (Natorp, 1904). The days when SP arose was long ago and today’s social pedagogy has in part been assigned another meaning, content and understanding. Traditionally the social pedagogical interest, at least in Sweden, has been in alienation and subordination in a more individualistic perspective. The tradition is most often associated with children, young people and different types of institutions (Markström, 2005; Münger, 2000) or, as has been the case in recent years, with analyses of constructs of alienation (Gustavsson, 2008). The same applies to CD where the more radical part of the tradition has also been overshadowed by other more individual-oriented, therapeutic perspectives (Mendes, 2009). But it is the collective more radical line that is of interest here. Different concepts have been proposed as being especially important when it comes to understanding social pedagogy. Participation and identity (Gustavsson, 2008) as well as community, bildung, dialogue and citizenship are examples of such concepts. These are concepts that to some extent also consolidate the community development tradition, where the focus is on concepts such as dialogue (see e.g. Westoby, 2008) and citizenship (see e.g. van der Veen, 2003). In its original form, this tradition focuses on social and economic development by means of upbringing or a community with the goal of bringing about local cooperation and a self-help situation (Tandon, 2008). Social pedagogy involves a pedagogical dimension in a social context and this is also how CD has been described. However, SP is sometimes associated with social work or is regarded as a method in social work. This pedagogical dimension reveals the collective and the collective learning in the tradition. Also in CD you can see this collective learning aspects and sometimes CD is practically equated with citizen education. This article focuses primarily on pedagogical processes that are seen as being within the framework of a theoretical CD tradition and a socio-pedagogical, theoretical frame of reference. In this context, frames of reference are used that rest on collective thinking where the individual is subordinated to the collective, at least from a theoretical perspective (Lorenz, 2008). In Sweden, traditions where the collective is emphasised are associated with methods such as social work, community work, local development, local mobilization etc. Both a socio-pedagogical collective line of thought, and a radical community development tradition, is often associated with mobilising work (Eriksson, 2006a; van der Veen, 2003). It is work where the group resources should be made visible and used. It is assumed that there is a collective capacity in the group based on all the resources and abilities of its members. The goal is that the group will become aware of its own situation, which could be characterised by alienation and marginalisation, and through this awareness be “liberated”, a way of thinking used by e.g. Paulo Freire (Freire, 1972). The idea behind this is that it is shortcomings in society’s resources and structures that create the individual’s or group’s problems. The methods used in such work are thus directed towards change processes in society where the dimension of acting is central. In the CD tradition, as in the socio-pedagogical tradition, there is a radical current that concerns self- organisation among marginalised and exclusionary groups in society (Eriksson, 2011; Mendes, 2008). The goal of these groups is to bring about societal change and to strive to attain, based on their interests, a better society (Westoby, 2008). Conflicts and provocation are prominent features. Different actions in the disability movement can be understood based on such a perspective. CD and SP are traditions related to communities that advocate different collective, self- organising activities with the aim of improving physical, social and economic conditions for groups and for local society. It is these that are focused on (Eriksson, 2006a; Mendes, 2008) and the goal is a change in the societal structures, not individuals. The theories are, in themselves, simplified E ducation Policy A nalysis A rchives V ol. 21 N o. 44 SPECIAL ISSUE 6 descriptions of connections and relations of conditions in different practical activities. I mean that they contain a number of more or less implicit dilemmas that I intend to discuss in the empirical section of this article. By relating the empirical data to the theories it is possible to expose those dilemmas. “The reality” does not always look as the theories suggest. Instead of dichotomies you can find situations that rather can be described in terms of dialectics. It is not a question of either – or it is rather. It is a question of “empirical provocation” in which the empirical data challenge the theoretical reasoning. The dichotomies or dilemmas contained in these theories, which have become more visible when empirical data and theory meet, are dilemmas that are connected in different ways. Fraser’s concepts, recognition versus redistribution, which I consider to be a dilemma or dichotomy, can be said to be connected to whether there exist experiences of a divided collective identity or not. This also brings up questions about who the mobilisation work should be directed towards; one’s own members, groups or structures in society in general. Methodology Access to the field My interest was to study mobilization work in an organization characterized by a collective self-development. In order to study this in practice I contacted a local chapter of DHR. You can say that I hade a foreshadowed problem and on that basis selected a setting (Hammersly & Atkinson, 1995). I called the chairman and we decided a time and place for a first meeting. On this occasion I asked if it was possible for me to follow their mobilization work. The chairman of the local chapter was also employed by the DHR, at the regional level. He had thus two roles, which were sometimes difficult for him to separate. The Chairman took my question to the board. The board consists of seven persons. Some of them were very active in the board work and seemed always willing to take responsibility, while others just participated in the boardmeeting and nothing more. The chairman on the other hand toke a heavy resonsiblility and did a lot of work himself. Partly this might have been a result of his employment, but the other representatives in the board seemed to relay on him. The board accepted my presence without any discussion. Later I was introduced to the board and at that time I had the possiblity to present my self and my study. The members seemed positive that anyone took an interest in their situation and work and hoped that this attention would be beneficial for the organization and themselves. Data gathering The empirical material was gathered in several different ways, a kind of method triangulation or method pluralism (Clifford & Marcus, 1986; Geertz, 1993). First, a number of informal conversations were held with the chairman as well as other board members and members of the local chapter. The conversations took place on different occasions such as during board meetings and members’ meetings, on my visits to the office and when the chapter was carrying out various activities. Overall, I participated in four meetings, one annual meeting and two actions outside the office directed towards the local society. I visited the organization about ten times in total.These conversations provided me with information on what was happening in the chapter, how they thought about and planned different questions. Immediately after the occasions when these conversations took place, I made notes, both on the content of the talks and on my own reflections. Later these notes were helpful in the analysis. In my own reflections, I made a number of possible interpretations. These, together with the theoretical foundation provided input to the final interpretation of the local chapter's mobilization efforts. I Dialectics instead of dichotomy 7 came into contact with other informants in the chapter via the chairman who introduced me to important informants. Second, I held two more structured interviews, planned in advance, with the chairman. These two interviews were based on the informal conversations as well as different theories studied at the same time during the process. During the interviews an interview guide was used in which major themes were listed. The interviews lasted between one and two hours and was taperecorded. Later relevant parts of the recordings was transcriebed.Together with the chairman, I also read a number of articles we felt to be relevant and useful for understanding the local chapter’s mobilizing work. From the beginning, the chairman was a key informant but he gradually also became a partner who cooperated, a phenomenon also described in other research projects, e.g. Foote Whytes Street Corner society (1993). The third way of gathering information was to participate in various activities such as board meetings, members’ meetings and some of the actions the local chapter initiated or participated in. Here, my role was mainly to sit at the side and observe, but I was also active to some extent, distributing flyers, setting up posters, etc. Being active in this way could be questioned but for me it was a conscious choice (se e.g. Foote Whyte, 1993). But I was passive during most of the observation period, observing and making notes of what was said and what happened. The fourth and final way of gathering data was by becoming acquainted with different documents, both in paper form and digital. Mostly it was different policy documents produced centrally by DHR but also descriptions of actions within the framework of different centrally initiated campaigns. I also read minutes of meetings, job descriptions and the like. Since my knowledge of the local section and it´s work were initially very limited, I chose to collect data in several different ways. All data collection was intended to give me a deeper understanding of how the local department worked, how different people reasoned, and how the interaction was between members. It had been difficult to achieve this only through interviews. The knowledge was used, togheter with the theory, in order to understand and interpret the chapter´s mobilization work. The analysis The analysis was started by reading through all interview transcriptions and all notes. When reading through I looked for things that could describe and increase understanding of the mobilization efforts in the chapter´s work. A number of themes of interest in relation to the purpose were visualized. While I was reading through the empirical material I returned to theory and with that as help I searched for additional interesting themes. I looked at the empirical data with theoretical eyes. So the starting point for the analysis was the empirical material, which was confronted by theories often used to describe activities such as those carried on by the local chapter, in this case, theories that are central in the socio-pedagogical and the community development traditions, respectively. These theories were complemented by two concepts, redistribution and recognition, which are common in research on the situation of marginalized groups. This way of working can be described as a play between theory and empirical data where the often dichotomous reasoning of the theories is challenged by the empirical “reality”. So through this, in some parts abductive process, I discovered various themes in the material, each in different ways related to the chapter's mobilisation work. The themes that were discovered were: - differences - sameness - self-mobilization – mobilization of others - internal – external leaders - a start in learning – a start in action. E ducation Policy A nalysis A rchives V ol. 21 N o. 44 SPECIAL ISSUE 8 Some of those themes could aslo be described in terms of dilemmas or dichotomies. In the next chapter I present these themes and the description includes both the empirical results and the theoretical interpretation of these. This is to deepen the understanding of practice. When I present the results, I have tried to make it as a story in which theory and empirical data interwine. I have therfore chosen not to exemplify with excerpts from notes I made or from interviews. The local chapter’s mobilizing work In socio-pedagogical traditions, mobilization is one of several features. Mobilizing work can differ and have different goals. In an earlier study, social pedagogues’ views of socio-pedagogical thinking were analyzed and the methods and values of mobilizing work were described (Eriksson, 2006a). The mobilizing part of social pedagogy concerns the group becoming aware of his and the group’s situation and thus being able to liberate itself from oppression and exclusionary situations. The central basic idea is that there exist human and material resources in the group that, under specific circumstances, can be developed. The same starting point can be found in the more radical side of the CD tradition (e.g. Mendes, 2009; van der Veen, 2003). This reflects a theoretical understanding of mobilisation but besides this several research projects have been conducted that have a focus on more practical mobilisation perspectives. For instance are the mobilisation work descriebed through different strategies, different leader styles, different outcomes etc. During the year, the local chapter carried out mobilising work, mainly in the form of the campaign Open Sweden, which the local chapter itself described as mobilising work. One important part of the campaign is, based on the perspective of the local chapter, a meeting in the town square, called the appeal meeting. This meeting was held in the local chapter’s municipality. The chairman got the idea for the meeting from information provided by other local chapters via the Internet and websites. The mobilising work around the meeting is described below and analyzed in relation to different theories. A divided identity - differences and sameness The idea for the appeal meeting was brought up by the chairman who, in turn, found inspiration on DHR’s website. He began by gaining the board’s support for the idea. At a board meeting, the chairman explained how he envisioned the meeting. The day would begin with the participants visiting different shops in a limited area and checking accessibility for persons with impaired mobility by using a questionnaire. A meeting in the town square and a speech would follow this where, among other things, the results of the survey would be announced. The chairman also wanted to initiate collaboration with other local disability organizations in this work. At the board meeting, all the members appeared to support the ideas presented by the chairman. There was, however, some discussion about their implementation in practice although nobody questioned the ideas behind the action itself. Everybody seems to understand the reasons for the activity and why it was important to carry out. Here, one could, of course, wonder why everybody was in agreement and whether this could be taken as an indication that there existed feelings of some form of disability identity, a question that has been studied and analyzed in several research reports. According to the chairman, this could in one sense be interpreted as that the group had a divided identity, an identity based on the common experience of having impaired mobility. The group consisted of many different persons with different political views, which were seldom talked about; rather, in the context in which the group met, the focus was on what they had in common. This is usually described as having a common political identity (Caroll & Ratner, 2001). The common Dialectics instead of dichotomy 9 experience of having impaired mobility or being labeled as such by others is also mentioned in other research as the only foundation for a collective identity (Beckett, 2006). Within the group, there is shared experience of exclusion, prejudice and discrimination (Shakespeare, 1993). Where theories talk about the existence or lack of collective identities, the empirical data show that the local chapter handles this in different ways depending on the situation. It's more a question of a dialectical relationship than a dichotomous one. Outwardly, a form of common collective identity is shown “when necessary”, something that can be interpreted as strategic essentialism in the terminology of Spivak. This identity is usually employed in external contacts in order to achieve a certain goal. It only becomes visible in situations like those described above, i.e. when there is a common concrete task where activities are directed towards external recipients. In this case, a collective identity is created in certain specific situations via the local chapter; a “we” is formulated. In my interpretation, this collective identity is the basis of Fraser’s concept of recognition. The chapter needs a common ground as a basis for its’ claim for recognition. This example illustrates the dilemma or the dichotomy of dealing with difference and sameness. One way to interpret this is that in this situation, the Board members choose to tacitly acknowledge the other's differences. They are aware of this differences but they do not talk about it. By not talking about the differences in the group the members will in some sense be same. The discussion about a collective diveded identity or not, leads to a resoning about differences and sameness. In the disablitiy movement studied, this turns out to be a dialectical relation. Self-mobilization or mobilizations of others? A week before the meeting in one of the squares in the town, a preliminary meeting was held. Six persons participated. A further three persons had intended to participate but were unable to do so. It was this group that was going to participate in the appeal meeting. All the participants came from DHR. Attempts had been made to persuade other associations, which have an interest in accessibility in society increasing, to participate but without success. The chairman explained that it was difficult to get others to take part. This difficulty in involving people has been described in several research reports (Eriksson, 2006b). A possible explanation in this case could be that every association has its own ideology and despite apparently similar problems, the associations’ specific needs could differ. The chairman was also disappointed at the passivity of his own organization and its members. According to the chairman, only a minority of the members were active. At this meeting the chairman gave information about the work. He also went through the questionnaire and gave tips about how to talk with the shop owners. He said that he intended to share the streets between the members taking part in the appeal meeting. He wanted each person to visit at least five shops and one or two streets. The chairman intended to contact some local newspapers in the hope that they would be interested in the action. The group also agreed that they would contact politicians from all the parties. On the day of the appeal meeting a total of seven persons attended the initial survey and the following appeal meeting. During the meeting, which lasted for about an hour, the chairman held a short speech in which he informed the general public about the ongoing campaign and the results of the survey. The same speech was repeated several times during the hour the meeting lasted. Meanwhile, the other members of the local chapter passed out flyers about the campaign and at the same time talked to people. Some people stopped to listen to the speech, some read the flyer and some began discussing with the DHR members. The “visible” interest shown during this hour was more or less as expected, according to the chairman. It is difficult to measure the effects of this type of activity. The chairman regarded it as a long-term process. E ducation Policy A nalysis A rchives V ol. 21 N o. 44 SPECIAL ISSUE 10 This mobilisation process can be regarded as being aimed in two directions, two processes that run practically parallel with each other. Firstly, a process aimed at mobilising members is in progress. Here, it is a question of training different civil rights skills and safeguarding civil rights. DHR describes its work as a “fight for civil rights” based on the UN declaration of human rights and the UN’s standard regulations, the purpose of which is to ensure that persons with mobility impairments have the same rights as other members of society (DHR, 2007). Through mobilisation, its own members are made aware of their rights and opportunities and the collective is strengthened by common actions. Klein (1984) describes a 3-stage process with respect to what she calls political consciousness that takes place in a collective where people feel marginalised. The first stage is the affiliation to the group that takes place through membership and a shared interest. This is consistent with the situation in the local chapter. One is a member of the association and shares, in this case, an interest in making society more accessible for people with mobility impairments. The second stage is a rejection of the definitions and regulations relating to the group’s position in society. Members do not accept being treated differently because they have mobility impairment. In the last stage, personal problems can be transformed into political demands when it is realised that they are a consequence of social institutions or social inequality. In my interpretation, the participants in the appeal meeting have reached the third stage in the political awareness process. All the members seem to believe that the problems lie in society, its organisation and its institutions. In this sense they are claiming for a redistribution of the recourses of society, but a redistribution based on recognition. The other direction that the mobilization process is aimed at is, a mobilization of “the others” in this case the general public, politicians, the mass media, etc. Through different activities in the mobilization process, people are confronted by their stereotype pictures of persons with mobility impairments and the goal is that this will make people aware of the situation facing people with mobility impairments. The local chapter wanted to reach out to the general public with knowledge about the social injustice its members are exposed to and it hoped that knowledge and awareness of this would persuade other people to take action, thus a claim for recognition. My interpretation is thus that this appeal meeting can be viewed as an example of an activity that goes beyond the borders between recognition and redistribution. The goal of the action was, in addition to strengthening the group, to achieve real results that improve the situation of people with mobility impairments. The message during the meeting was quite clear. Society’s decision-makers must take their responsibility and change the conditions that contribute to worsening accessibility. At the same time, there was a desire, although implicit in this context, to get the general public to better understand the situation facing persons with impaired mobility, a cultural recognition in other words. In this way, the dichotomy of recognition and redistribution was transformed into a dialectical relationship. Internal or external leader? One hope of the meeting was to recruit new members. The numbers of members were steadily declining in the orgnaisation. It was hoped that by being seen and showing its potential, the local chapter would also be able to attract other people as members. This can be regarded as consciousness-raising activity in relation to persons outside the organization. So this was a work with ambitions to get people interested and engaged in disability issues. When an organization attempts increase awareness in this way, the organization’s own versions and perspectives are promoted. You Dialectics instead of dichotomy 11 have to be as compelling as possible.This situation, with an internal leader involved, could be very different from activities initiated and run by professionals since then it is often a question of a more neutral framing of the message. Descriptions of meanings of socio-pedagogical traditions often assume the presences of a professional, which in itself could signify that the goal is a type of neutrality. Rothman (1969) describes a division into four different ways in which an initiator, leader or pedagogue can act when it comes to how directive one should be and how clearly one can present one’s message. The way in which DHR’s local chapter acts could, using Rothman’s terminology, be called channeling, that means highly directive, or funneling which stands for considerably directive. In the first case, it is a question of the leader advocating a special standpoint, which he supports with arguments and documentation. This was exactly what happened during the appeal meeting. Using the survey carried out by the members, the chairman was able to prove that there were shortcomings in accessibility in shops, on pavements and in streets and squares. In this type of context, he is quite right in presenting the organization’s view since everybody who listens is aware that he is speaking from the organization’s perspective. He is not required to be “neutral” in the sense of emphasizing and presenting several different standpoints without favoring any one standpoint (scanning and non- directive, according to Rothman, 1969). My interpretation is that there is a clear difference between mobilization via a professional or external leader and an internal leader. The professional leader is expected to be more non-directive than the internal leader. The professional leader should at most be mildly directive (scanning) by presenting different possible solutions in an impartial, similar way. In this way, he indicates what the limits are within which alternative ways of thinking, conducting oneself and acting can be chosen. A start in learning or in action? The mobilizing work initiated at the board meeting has similarities with what in the CD tradition is described as a form of citizenship training that consists of initiating the whole mobilization process with an action. Action comes first and is followed by some form of learning and training (van der Veen, 2003). In CD terms, this mobilizing work is called “education as training” – first the activity takes place, followed by reflection or learning. Actions such as this appeal meeting can be said to emphasize a here-and-now perspective. This form of action-oriented citizenship training could also be part of a socio-pedagogical tradition. Action together with relation and dialogue has been described as important socio- pedagogical tools. In a socio-pedagogical tradition, action is often described as a consequence of a consciousness-raising process, i.e. the process begins with learning and then leads to an action or activity. There are socio-pedagogical ways of reasoning where action becomes both the means and the goal (Eriksson, 2006a). In a way, the chairman can be said to be using his own action as a means for initiating a mobilization process among the other members. The chairman’s action becomes the means for getting the members to carry out an action/activity. In interviews, it emerged that his own strategy was that by gaining the support of a few members for a, hopefully, successful action, the other members would want to participate at a later stage. The local chapter’s actions in the form of the appeal meeting can be described in terms of “education as training”, i.e. the staging of an action without a prior conscious focus on learning. I argue, however, that the whole process can be seen as consciousness-raising strategy in the CD- traditions sometimes called “Education as consciousness raising”. Here, education/learning comes first and is followed by an action or several actions. An example of this is the local chapter’s strategy of making politicians and the general public aware. Within the socio-pedagogical tradition, there are also similar ways of reasoning. Having competences in the form of both practical skills and theoretical knowledge has been considered to E ducation Policy A nalysis A rchives V ol. 21 N o. 44 SPECIAL ISSUE 12 be important (Madsen, 2006). Both are equally important and are each others precondition. Maybe is it possible to regard the chapters’ work as an on going process where actions are followed by moments of reflection and learning which in turn is followed by actions etc. This is the process of mobilisation. Discussion DHR could be regarded as a volunteer organisation and in that sense be described as a “we- for-us organisation” (Mallander, Meeuwisse & Sunesson, 1998). These organisations are characterised by a horizontal structure, an association of users who in some sense protect their common interests. This self-help tradition has a distinct collective orientation and is based on principles of solidarity in the group but also, to some extent, solidarity with others in similar situations. Generally speaking, self-help organisations are characterised by the fact that they are volunteer organisations, they are self-governing and are based on their members’ experienced knowledge of the group as such and its resources. What they also have in common is a critical attitude towards authorities and bureaucratic systems. This is consistent with how DHR is described in this article. The concept of self-help groups was developed primarily in the wake of the civil rights movement in the USA. The disability movement in the US is by some researchers described as successful when it comes to achieving results in the form of, for example, changes in legislation (Borkman, 1997). Describing the organisation in this way, i.e. to strive to win legally defined civil rights, is made explicit by, for example, the branch of the disability movement called the Independent Living Movement (Enns, 2009). The Independent Living Movement is foremost American and researchers have pointed to the differences that can exist in the situation in different countries. For example, some describes the activities carried out in the US as more oriented towards accessibility and expanding social rights for persons with mobility impairments. In the UK, on the other hand, the disability movement is said to also focus on a radical repudiation of the common perception of normality and instead it strives to change the structures that create the disability. My interpretation is that the local chapter studied here has more similarities with the American disability movement than the British disability movement in this respect. It strives to bring about changes in the form of better accessibility based on an affirmative perspective, to borrow Fraser’s terminology. In the local chapter, there are also ideas about repudiation of the “normal” normalisation concept, but in my view there is also affirmative perspective in this case. Borrowing once again Fraser’s terminology, one could describe the local chapter’s ambitions as affirmative redistribution and affirmative recognition. The local chapter’s ambitions are thus situated between the dichotomy recognition and redistribution and can be described as a bivalent collective (Fraser, 2003b) a movement from the dichotomic to the dialectic as the best way of describing and understanding the ambitions of the local chapter. References Beckett, A. E. (2006) Understanding social movements: theorising the disability movement in conditions of late modernity. The Sociological Review, 54 (4), 734–752. Berlak, A. & Berlak, H. (1981) Dilemmas of Schooling. Teaching and Social Change. Borkman, T. (1997) a selective look at self-help groups in the United States. Health and Social Care in Community, 5(6), 357 -364. Caroll, W. & Ratner, R. (2001). Sustaining Oppositional Cultures in ’Post-Socialist’ Times: A Comparative Study of Three Social Movement Organisations. 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(eds.). The dynamics of Social Movements: Resource Mobilization, Social Control, and Tactics. Cambridge: Winthrop. www.dhr.se Dialectics instead of dichotomy 15 About the Author Associate professor Lisbeth Eriksson Department behavioural sciences and learning, Linköping University, Sweden lisbeth.eriksson@liu.se Lisbeth Eriksson is an associate professor in the adult education field. She is working at Linköping University. She has two main research interest; adult education in the multicultural society and theoretical understandings of social pedagogy. About the Guest Co-Editors Guest Co-Editor Dr. Daniel Schugurensky Arizona State University dschugur@asu.edu Full professor at Arizona State University (ASU), with a joint appointment in the School of Public Affairs and the School of Social Transformation. Head of the Area of Justice and Social Inquiry, and coordinator of the Masters program in Social and Cultural Pedagogy. Has written extensively on youth and adult education, community development and participatory democracy. Among his recent authored and co-edited books are Ruptures, continuities and re-learning: The political participation of Latin Americans in Canada (Transformative Learning Centre, University of Toronto, 2006), Four in Ten: Spanish-Speaking Youth and Early School Leaving in Toronto (LARED, 2009), Learning citizenship by practicing democracy: international initiatives and perspectives (Cambridge Scholarly Press, 2010), Paulo Freire (Continuum, 2011), and Volunteer work, informal learning and social action (Sense 2013). Guest Co-Editor Michael Silver Arizona State University michael.silver@asu.edu Michael Silver is a Research Fellow at the National Center on Education and the Economy and the Center for the Future of Arizona. As Doctoral Student in Educational Policy and Evaluation, his research focuses on policies affecting educational equity and issues of social justice - particularly those related to historically vulnerable, minority populations. E ducation Policy A nalysis A rchives V ol. 21 N o. 44 SPECIAL ISSUE 16 SPECIAL ISSUE Social Pedagogy in the 21st Century education policy analysis archives Volume 21 Number 44 April 30th, 2013 ISSN 1068-2341 Readers are free to copy, display, and distribute this article, as long as the work is attributed to the author(s) and Education Policy Analysis Archives, it is distributed for non- commercial purposes only, and no alteration or transformation is made in the work. More details of this Creative Commons license are available at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/. All other uses must be approved by the author(s) or EPAA. 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Asociados Alejandro Canales (UNAM) y Jesús Romero Morante (Universidad de Cantabria) Armando Alcántara Santuario Instituto de Investigaciones sobre la Universidad y la Educación, UNAM México Fanni Muñoz Pontificia Universidad Católica de Perú Claudio Almonacid Universidad Metropolitana de Ciencias de la Educación, Chile Imanol Ordorika Instituto de Investigaciones Economicas – UNAM, México Pilar Arnaiz Sánchez Universidad de Murcia, España Maria Cristina Parra Sandoval Universidad de Zulia, Venezuela Xavier Besalú Costa Universitat de Girona, España Miguel A. 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Gandin (Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul) Dalila Andrade de Oliveira Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Brasil Jefferson Mainardes Universidade Estadual de Ponta Grossa, Brasil Paulo Carrano Universidade Federal Fluminense, Brasil Luciano Mendes de Faria Filho Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Brasil Alicia Maria Catalano de Bonamino Pontificia Universidade Católica-Rio, Brasil Lia Raquel Moreira Oliveira Universidade do Minho, Portugal Fabiana de Amorim Marcello Universidade Luterana do Brasil, Canoas, Brasil Belmira Oliveira Bueno Universidade de São Paulo, Brasil Alexandre Fernandez Vaz Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Brasil António Teodoro Universidade Lusófona, Portugal Gaudêncio Frigotto Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, Brasil Pia L. Wong California State University Sacramento, U.S.A Alfredo M Gomes Universidade Federal de Pernambuco, Brasil Sandra Regina Sales Universidade Federal Rural do Rio de Janeiro, Brasil Petronilha Beatriz Gonçalves e Silva Universidade Federal de São Carlos, Brasil Elba Siqueira Sá Barreto Fundação Carlos Chagas, Brasil Nadja Herman Pontificia Universidade Católica –Rio Grande do Sul, Brasil Manuela Terrasêca Universidade do Porto, Portugal José Machado Pais Instituto de Ciências Sociais da Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal Robert Verhine Universidade Federal da Bahia, Brasil Wenceslao Machado de Oliveira Jr. Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Brasil Antônio A. S. Zuin Universidade Federal de São Carlos, Brasil