Local government and practice ontologies: agency, resistance and sector speaks in homelessness services

Abstract

Present accounts of local government under neoliberalism risk poorly characterising and conceptualising forms of resistance by local actors. Institutional actors, and statutory agents in particular, have long been subject to analyses in order to appraise their complicity with, and resistance to oppressive political rationalities. Debates have gathered pace under 'austerity' and swingeing fiscal cuts to local budgets, consistent with the action of post-industrial nation states after the 2008 financial crash. The article argues that at the heart of existing accounts is the failure to engage with how institutional structures come to formation and how human agents come to action. Informed by relational and ontological approaches to the 'making-of' state formations, the 'sector speaks' concept is introduced. The concept draws on local actors' narratives from an empirical study of housing and homelessness practices, demonstrating these as a governance-action interface, 'lived' through day-to-day actions and social practices. This approach provides an alternative insight into human agents' actions, behaviours and capacities for resistance, and how these may be captured through local government research.

Local Government: A Social Ontology of Care

“…1, 3) . The value of social ontologies of local government has been demonstrated by, amongst others, Dobson (2020) and Zarić et al . (2023) .…”

“…Nevertheless, questions like these are important considering that both the concept 'local government' and the reality to which it refers comprises human constructions within diverse contexts, with possible dissimilar characteristics . The relevance of these questions is evident from Ƿ studies of the practice ontologies of local government (Dobson, 2020) Ƿ the semantic representation of the local government strategic planning process (Zarić et al ., 2023) Ƿ Barnett and co-authors' contribution on the study of 'actually existing' practice (Barnett et al ., 2020, p . 505) Ƿ the social ontology of purpose (Martela, 2023;Morrison & Mota, 2023a) As an ontology is expected to provide semantic descriptions of a specific phenomenon (such as local government), the conceptual study on which this article reports, aimed to develop a social ontology of local government .…”

Book review forum: Housing in the Margins

“…While such optics lend themselves to highlighting the top-down powers of domination and oppression, they tend to obscure the small-scale interventions that may be powered by practices that work in more horizontal ways. Rachael Dobson's commentary here and analysis elsewhere (Dobson, 2020) highlight the necessity to depict the state 'as is', constantly in the making through practices that may appear both big and small. Dobson enquires about the possibilities of such an approach to explore 'opportunities for disruption' in the 'fight for social and racial justice'.…”

NGO–Public Administration Relationships in Tackling the Homelessness Problem in the Czech Republic and Poland

“…A different attitude towards the homeless is described by the researchers Clarke and Parsell, who point out that local business, various services and institutions work together to hide the homeless from view in the tourist areas of the Australian city of Cairns (Clarke and Parsell 2018). On the other hand, a broader analysis of the spatial perspective of research on homelessness is carried out by DeVerteuil, May and Von Mahs (DeVerteuil et al 2009), while Dobson (2020) presents how practitioners work with the homeless in northern England in the conditions of neoliberal state policy and necessity to cut down on expenses. Koprowska, Kronenberg, Kuźma and Łaszkiewicz (Koprowska et al 2020) are the authors of an empirical study which includes interviews not only with practitioners (streetworkers) helping the homeless, but also homeless people themselves (the selection criterion was the use of urban green spaces by them).…”