Social Love and the Critical Potential of People: When the Social Reality Challenges the Sociological Imagination

Description

This book unveils the concept of social love as a kind of "Karst River" that flows through the history of sociology, reassessing it as a form criticism by people in everyday life. Adopting an interdisciplinary perspective, this book offers both theoretical and empirical reflections on social love. It shows that love is not only central to the human experience, but that it can also help to interpret and intervene in social problems such as climate change, poverty, xenophobia, and the (post-)Covid crisis, recognizing people as actors in social change. It explores the idea of love as a key element in the promotion of solidarity and recognition in today’s plural and unequal societies. Based on empirical research on social love conducted through both qualitative and quantitative methods, especially in Europe and Latin America, this book explores the social dimension of love. Providing overviews on key questions and studies on current issues, the book is essential reference and resource for researchers, students, social workers, and professionals in social sciences, social philosophy, anthropology, social psychology, sociology of emotions and postmodern literature. Cover Half Title Series Information Title Page Copyright Page Dedication Table of Contents Illustrations Contributors Preface Introduction Part I Overview Insight 1 When Reality Challenges Sociological Imagination: What Social Love Is in a Critical Perspective 1.1 Introduction 1.2 The Concept of Social Love 1.3 The Dimensions of Social Love 1.4 The Characteristics of Social Love 1.5 Conclusions Note References 2 Imagining On the Shoulders of Giants: A Historical Selection of the Social Thought On Love 2.1 Introduction 2.2 The Philosophical Concept of Love 2.3 The Contribution of the Classics of Sociological Thought 2.4 The Contribution of the Secularisation of Love in Contemporary Sociology 2.5 The Contribution of Feminist Literature 2.6 The Contribution of Critical Sociology 2.7 The Contribution of Contemporary Interdisciplinary Literature 2.8 Conclusions References Evidence 3 For an Empirical Study of Social Love: Epistemological and Methodological Research Approaches 3.1 Introduction 3.2 Methodology of Social Love 3.3 Studying Social Love Through a Qualitative Methodology 3.4 Social Love in a Quantitative Perspective 3.5 Conclusion Note References Current Issues 4 Social Systems and Social Love: A Macro-Perspective On the History of Civilisations 4.1 Introduction 4.2 The Dawn of Civilisation and the Agricultural Empires 4.3 Imperial Rome 4.4 Middle Ages, Humanism and the First Industrial Revolution 4.5 The Market Economy and the Springtime of the Peoples 4.6 The Second Industrial Revolution and the Emotional Foundation of Action References 5 Social Love as Utopian and Heterotopian Experiences in Contemporary Society 5.1 Introduction: Crisis and Emancipation 5.2 Social Love as a Utopian and Heterotopian Experience 5.3 Social Love and the Utopian Critique of Geometrism 5.4 Social Love as a Resource to Liberate Post-Enlightenment Thinking 5.5 Social Love and Philosophical Sociology 5.6 Final Notes: Social Love and the Political Heterotopia Notes References Part II Social Love as Overabundance Insight 6 Social Love as an Approach: Notes From the Field 6.1 Introduction 6.2 My Trajectory 6.3 Listening to the “Enemy” 6.4 Looking for More Convivial Neighborliness 6.5 Conclusions Notes References Evidence 7 Giving Without Expectations: The Results of the World Love Index 7.1 Introduction 7.2 The World Love Index 7.3 Ecological World Love Indices 7.4 Conclusion Notes Current Issues 8 Collective Action and Love 8.1 Introduction 8.2 Emotions and Collective Actions 8.3 Filial Love: a Summarized Gaze 8.3.1 Geopolitics of Love 8.4 A New Opening Notes References 9 Social Love and Social Movements in the Pandemic 9.1 Introduction 9.2 Solidarity and Care in the Pandemic 9.3 Autonomous Communities and Communal Health 9.4 Mutual Aid and Organization at the Neighbourhood Level 9.5 (Counter-)information Networks 9.6 Alternative Practices and Resistance 9.7 From Mutual Aid to Democratization 9.8 Conclusions Notes References Part III Social Love as Care of Others and the World Insight 10 Re-Imagining Cosmopolitics: Love as Taking Care of the World 10.1 Introduction 10.2 Redescribing Our Narratives: Looking for New Vocabularies 10.3 Imagining a Cosmopolitics of Affects 10.4 A Matter of Perspective 10.5 More Than Stories: Overcoming Epistemic Injustices Notes References Evidence 11 Educational Poverty and Care for Others: A Relation Between Human Development and Social Love 11.1 Introduction 11.2 Material Deprivation, Family Heritage, Class Relations: Perspectives On Educational Poverty 11.3 Towards a Socio-Educational Model Based On Social Love: First Insights From an Empirical Case 11.4 One Concept, Multiple Levels of Analysis Notes References 12 Social Love in Pandemic Times: An Opportunity to Generate and Regenerate Social Relationships 12.1 Introduction 12.2 Social Love: a Theoretical and Methodological Framework During the Lockdown Period 12.3 Social Love During Lockdown: the Results of a Survey 12.3.1 Lockdown and Health Conceptions 12.4 Conclusions: Physical Isolation as an Opportunity for Social Love to Generate and Regenerate Relationships Note References 13 Social Love in Healthcare Professionals: Some Preliminary Reflections On a Missing Issue 13.1 Introduction 13.2 A Literature Review of Love in Professional Healthcare Practice 13.3 Social Love in Organisational and Professional Contexts 13.4 Social Love in Nursing: an Empirical Case 13.5 Conclusion Note References Current Issues 14 Poverty and Generative Welfare: Perspectives for a New Approach to Social Intervention 14.1 Background 14.2 Why Generative Welfare? 14.3 Theoretical and Methodological Issues 14.4 For an Effective Fight Against Poverty 14.5 Generative Practices and Social Innovation 14.6 Generativity and Social Love in Social Work 14.7 All Is Not Lost 14.8 A Chance for Social Work 14.9 Not Only of the Users References 15 Post-Covid Perspectives: An Overview On Inequalities and Love Experiences in Latin America 15.1 Introduction 15.2 Brief History of the Conformation of Latin American Social Protection Systems 15.3 The Dimensions of Social Love in the Architecture of the Social Protection Systems 15.3.1 Measures of Social Love Taken By Social Protection Systems in Covid-19 Contexts 15.3.2 Measures of Overabundance (Unconditionality) 15.3.3 Measures to Extend Recognition 15.3.4 Measures That Extended Universalism 15.3.5 Care Measures and Priority of the Benefit of the Other 15.4 Reforms Needed in the SPS Architecture 15.5 Conclusions References Part IV Social Love as Universalism Insight 16 Towards a Convivialist Society: How to Think and Act for Pluriversalism 16.1 Introduction: How to Rethink Living Together 16.2 Signs of Hope: the Experience of the Convivialist Manifesto 16.3 Acting for Pluriversalism: a Global Citizen Parliament 16.4 Conclusions References Evidence 17 Universal Is Plural: The Results of a Comparative Study From Secondary Sources 17.1 Which Universalism? A Brief Review 17.2 Method 17.2.1 Data Analysis From Secondary Sources 17.2.2 Data 17.3 Findings 17.4 Concluding Remarks Notes References Current Issues 18 Common Goods and Institutions as Fields of Impersonal Action 18.1 Introduction 18.2 Max Weber and the Ethics of Universal Brotherhood 18.3 Commons as a Field of Impersonal Action 18.4 The Commons as Institutional Forms 18.5 The Daily Life of Public Institutions 18.6 Care as Institutional Property References Part V Social Love as Recognition of Others Insight 19 Love in Democracy: Unfolding Sovereignty, Resonating Common Good 19.1 Introduction 19.2 At the Root: Recognizing Love in Recognition Relationships 19.3 The Populist Economy of Emotions and the Self-Destruction of Democracy 19.3.1 Populism as a Regime of Passions and Emotions 19.3.2 The Exacerbation of Control and the Search for Lost Resonance 19.4 Loving, Resonating, and Unfolding: a Democratic Anthropology 19.5 Coda: Amplification of Overabundance and Unfolding of Sovereignty Notes References Evidence 20 Radical Love and Forgiveness: Re-Suturing the Social Racial Wounds in the United States 20.1 The Diaries of Two Foretold Crimes 20.2 The Love Deficiencies of Entitlement 20.3 The Love Deprivation of Pain in Suspension 20.4 Forgiveness: Responding With an Overflowing Abundance (Of Love) 20.5 The Hermeneutics of Transformative Forgiveness References Current Issues 21 Love Beyond Coloniality: Encountering the Other, Love Precarity, and the Idiosyncrasies of Love From the South 21.1 Introduction 21.2 Coloniality as Love Precarity 21.2.1 The Legacies of Colonial Encounters and the Institutionalization of Love Precarity 21.2.2 Being Different, How Did We Learn to See Others and Ourselves? 21.3 Idiosyncrasies of Love From the South 21.3.1 Love as “Being” Among the M.bêngôkre M.tyktire (Kayapó), From Northern Brazil 21.3.2 The Anglophone Crisis in Cameroon: Responding With Love to the Lack of Recognition (Of “Each Other”) 21.4 In Lak’ech: Liberation By Loving the Other 21.5 Conclusion: a World Unfinished and in the Making Notes References Conclusion Index