Dialogues with the absent Other: Using reported speech and the vocabulary of citizenship for contesting ecological laws and institutions

Abstract

This article examines how a professional group articulates views of the new laws and institutions that call them to accept new practices and new meaning in the name of the ecological common good. Drawing on a framework integrating the approach of social representations and rhetorical social psychology with legal institutionalism, we analyze in-depth interviews and focus groups ( n = 29) with artisanal fishers. We explore how fishers use reported speech, that is, the quotation of others or self in own discourse, for building representations of Self, institutional-Others and their relations, examining also the values and dimensions of citizenship they mobilize with it. We show how fishers consistently use reported speech for presenting a negative institutional-Other acting in disrespect of the civil and political dimensions of citizenship, and a positive Self acting as a competent citizen – although rarely as a good ecological citizen. We discuss how focusing on reported speech by drawing on a theorization of how the institutional dimension interacts with the micro-level of interaction and discourse extends current comprehension of how contestation of the new meaning embedded in new laws can be warranted and maintained.

Is the press presenting (neoliberal) foreign residency laws in a depoliticised way? The case of investment visas and the reconfiguring of citizenship

“…This is done by focusing on neoliberal legal innovations directly affecting citizenship, which incorporate and legitimise certain values and representations of the common good (Castro, 2012), and by analysing how these are reflected or suppressed in the press. Extending existing research, we thus explored the link between the macro-level of legal representations of citizenship and the micro-level of everyday meaning-making (Andreouli et al, 2017;Batel & Castro, 2018;Castro, 2012;Castro & Santos, 2020;Howarth et al, 2013;Mahendran et al, 2019) for a better understanding of citizenship under neoliberal rules. Specifically, we explored how a legal innovation regarding citizenship and migration, informed by economic values, was discursively presented in the press -and helped shape everyday debates and representations of citizenship and migration.…”

“…Citizenship is often defined as "a status of a legal and political membership of a state" (Verkuyten, 2018, p. 226) and is usually equated to nationality. The notion of citizenship is, however, far more complex and extensive than a simple equation with nationality (Andreouli, 2019;Bosniak, 2006;Castro & Santos, 2020;Gibson, 2011;Langhout & Fernández, 2018;Stevenson et al, 2015). Citizenship regimes are laws and legal frameworks that regulate several dimensions of people's relation with a nation, with some determining the conditions for foreigners/migrants' entrance, residency in and exit from a country (Vink, 2017).…”

“…This means that while entering and when inside a polity -and before any process of naturalisation -foreigners have citizenship rights and duties. The laws and legal procedures defining such rights and duties incorporate definitions of who belongs and can stay and under what conditions (Bosniak, 2006), reifying or objectifying different 'types' of migrants (Castro & Santos, 2020;Mahendran, Magnusson, Howarth, & Scuzarello, 2019). Changes in these legal frameworks reconfigure the meanings and limits of citizenship for migrants.…”

From one new law to (many) new practices? Multidisciplinary teams re‐constructing the meaning of a new disability law

“…When a new idea gains some consensus in a society, it is sometimes institutionalized as a new law, a form of prioritizing and seeking to stabilize some meaning categories (e.g. principles, values) and rules over others (Castro, 2012;Castro & Santos, 2020;Elcheroth, Doise, & Reicher, 2011). Then, when the new law enters into force, the translation of these principles, values and rules to specific contexts and concrete practices mobilizes complex psycho-social processes of meaning-making, some of which may transform it: for example, selection and adaptation to context, re-signification, resistance to rules despite acceptance of principles (Brondi, Sarrica, Cibin, Neresini, & Contarello, 2012;Castro, 2012;Castro & Batel, 2008;Sarrica, Brondi, Piccolo, & Mazzara, 2016).…”

“…The paper draws on social representations theory (Moscovici, 1961), a psycho-social approach theorizing how meaning-making as both a cultural and a relational achievement is brought about through discourse and communication (Batel & Castro, 2018;Castro & Santos, 2020;Jovchelovitch, 2019;Markova, Linell, Grossen, & Salazar Orvig, 2007). For understanding meaning-making about laws and their practical implementation, the approach focuses on relations and collective practices (Elcheroth et al, 2011), as well as on the tensions between old and new ideas (Castro, 2012).…”