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  • Chapter 3: between autonomy and care: em...
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    Plan détaillé Texte intégral Introduction Social assessments and the construction of reality The work of the emotions and the defence of the rights of the elderly Final considerations Bibliographie Notes de bas de page Auteurs

    Emotions and Public Policies

    Ce livre est recensé par

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    Table des matières

    Chapter 3: between autonomy and care: emotions and actions in defence of the rights of the elderly

    Ceres Víctora et Monalisa Dias de Siqueira

    p. 83-116

    Texte intégral Bibliographie Notes de bas de page Auteurs

    Texte intégral

    Introduction

    1At a family health centre in the east zone of Porto Alegre, Brazil, an “elderly group” (grupo de idosos) meets to debate topics and distribute information about the health of people aged over 65 in the community. This is a regular activity run by the local health service, which adheres to the Active Aging Policy guidelines set by Brazil’s Ministry of Health. Following a predetermined schedule of activities, employees distributed leaflets that contained a series of proposed procedures for elderly people to help them remain healthy as they continue to age. A nutrition intern, a social worker, a nurse, and a researcher were also in attendance. They introduced themselves in an informal and friendly way to the “elderly group” members. After this initial moment of integration, the nurse distributed the “User Booklet” to the elderly participants. Once everyone had a copy, she explained that the group would choose a chapter to discuss at each weekly meeting. On that day, after reading the title of the booklet, “Living well until over 100 years! Guidelines on healthy life habits,” (Vivendo bem até mais de 100! Orientações sobre hábitos de vida saudáveis’”) the nurse asked, “Who wouldn’t want to live one hundred years?” The room fell silent. She asked the question again, smiling and emphasizing her surprise by the lack of response: “Don’t you want to live to be over one hundred years old?” The participants’ facial expressions suggested doubts, but given the expectation of a reply, a few tentatively answered: “maybe…”; “who knows?”; “I don’t think so,”; “only if I’m in good health; not if it means work for others…”

    2We begin1 with this scene at the health centre2 because this article aims to question the values inherent in public policies for the elderly population: namely, longevity as a universal and unquestionable ideal. This value is included in the Active Aging Policy and championed by professionals who work with elderly people, including nurses, social workers, nutritionists, and physiotherapists. “Active aging” is a concept that applies to both individuals and groups, and refers to the optimization of opportunities for health, participation, and safety through care or monitoring of a person’s physical, mental and social dimensions throughout their entire life, not just during old age.

    3For individuals to attain the favourable (and expected) state of good health, participation, and safety, they are encouraged to maintain their ‘autonomy’ and ‘independence.’ To achieve this aim, several governmental and non-governmental projects and programs exist, such as municipal, state and federal councils for the elderly, elderly groups in family health centres, and support groups run by neighbourhood associations and churches, which all promote “active aging.” Along with these objectives, which are all based on leading international scientific studies that follow established guidelines for promoting health, we can also note that individuals are increasingly held accountable for their own physical, psychological, and social well-being, for reducing diseases, for their own productivity and social participation, and, above all, for prolonging their own life span. Moreover, while this shows the value of life, it also implies that life, to be worth living, must be “active” and “healthy.”

    4In asking how individuals can maintain an active and healthy life, another anthropological question arises: what happens to elderly people who cannot meet this ideal? Do these health policies help protect the elderly who, for various reasons, do not remain autonomous and independent? Who cares about and for the dependent elderly? What does it mean to care? What actions and emotions mobilize care and professional assistance for dependent elderly people?

    5Changes in the Brazilian age structure over recent decades are clear, especially in relation to the narrowing base and expanding top of the demographic pyramid. According to the Continuous National Household Sample Survey – Characteristics of Residents and Households (Pesquisa Nacional por Amostra de Domicílios Contínua – Características dos Moradores e Domicílios), the overall Brazilian population has continued to grow older. Between 2012 and 2017, the number of elderly people rose by 4.8 million, totalling over 30.2 million (Paradella, 2018). These figures represent a 18% increase in this age group, which has become ever more diverse and representative in Brazil. In relation to gender, women comprise the majority of this group, numbering 16.9 million (56%), while elderly men number 13.3 million (44%).

    6During this same period between 2012 and 2017, the number of elderly people increased in all federal states. Rio de Janeiro (in the southeast) and Rio Grande do Sul (in the south) had the highest proportion of elderly citizens, with 18.6% of their populations in the 60+ age group. In recent research published by FGV Social (Neri, 2020) concerning the distribution of the elderly population across the country, the federal state with the highest proportion of elderly people was also Rio Grande do Sul (13.13%), and Porto Alegre was the capital city with the highest percentage of elderly people (12.05%).3

    7Policies for the health and rights of elderly people4 at the national and international level have drawn attention to the importance of the participation of this demographic group in society. In Brazil, the National Health Survey (Pesquisa Nacional de Saúde) PNS 2013 (IBGE 2015) investigated, among other topics, the ‘functional limitations’ that people aged 60 or over face when independently performing activities of daily living (ADL) and instrumental activities of daily living (IADL).5 The results show that older age groups had a higher proportion of people with functional limitations. In the 60+ group, researchers found that 84% needed help accomplishing ADLs and that 17.3% have functional limitations that hamper their performance of IADLs. The survey also showed that most care is provided by family members; among those who needed help to perform their ADLs, 17.8% received remunerated care from someone (a relative or non-relative, resident or not in the same home) while 78.8% received care from a relative (resident or not in the same home, with or without remuneration).

    8This scenario is similar throughout the country, and this data prompts questions about how public health policies for the elderly are designed and how families cope with providing care. Both the Statute of the Elderly (Brazil, 2003) and the National Policy for the Elderly (Brazil, 1994) state that care for elderly people is the responsibility of the family, the State and society, without determining or specifying which duties each of these institutions should assume.

    9Given this situation, it is important to think about the family types that are naturalized and internalized in Brazilian society, as well as the informal arrangements for elderly care that historically involve adult children caring for elderly parents while benefitting from their income, especially in low-income groups. As in other social processes in Brazil, income inequality and social inequality are apparent in different forms of aging. In one group are elderly people who can pay for help themselves or through support from their families; in another group, there are those who cannot afford to pay, who have no family, or whose families are unable to care for them.

    10This article examines an Administrative Procedure (AP) that forms part of a Civil Inquiry (CI)6 instigated by the Public Prosecutor’s Office (PPO)7 of the State of Rio Grande do Sul with the purpose of ascertaining the availability of places to shelter elderly people in the municipality of Porto Alegre, as well as soliciting these places in Long-Stay Institutions for the Elderly (Instituições de Longa Permanência para Idosos) (ILPI) for care-dependent elderly people who receive no assistance from family and who live on a minimum wage income or less. The AP comprises a series of formal actions undertaken with the aim of providing information to the PPO in the construction of a demand made to government bodies. They contain the personal data of the elderly person, a description of the matter in question (the denunciation or the motive for which the AP was initiated), assessments and reports by social workers, medical and/or psychiatric reports, and official requests for measures to be taken with deadlines set for their implementation. After the AP is launched, other documents are added, such as official letters, orders, protective measures, manifestations, and contestations.

    11In the case analysed here, the request for assistance is directed to the municipal bodies responsible for providing institutional shelter for elderly people considered dependent and/or in a situation of “social risk.” The article focuses specifically on the “social reports” that comprise an essential part of the AP. These are written by social workers, who are responsible for directly assessing the cases and producing reports that support and advise the work of the PPO’s prosecutors. The social workers who work in specialized PPOs are responsible for reading official documents, making telephone calls, e-mailing involved parties, planning interventions, conducting interviews, making home and/or hospital visits, participating in hearings with families held at the Public Prosecutor’s Office, and producing the “social report.” The “social report” is a succinct and objective exposition of the family, financial, and residential situation of the elderly person, grounded in the theoretical, ethical and technical principles of the social services, and ultimately recommends a solution to the problem. Besides the in-situ description, the “social report” also presents a biographical history of the elderly person, their family and neighbour relations, and photographic images that provide evidence of the “risk situation,” “vulnerability” and “dependency” in which the person finds him or herself.

    12It is through the “social report” that social workers seek “to influence the decision of the Public Prosecutor’s Offices” to promote the right of the elderly person to receive care in a long-stay institution, even though they generally agree with the Statute of the Elderly (institutionalization is not the best option and families should ideally receive support to provide care). In the absence of a family, however, it falls to social workers to demonstrate the “complexity of the social issues involved in the life of the dependent elderly person, including poverty, social vulnerability, unemployment, lack of access to housing, and, frequently, violence” (Nascimento, 2012).

    13In this sense, the ‘social report’ is a key document of the AP on which the success of the demand depends. As shown in this article, the ‘social report’ makes use of a series of narrative resources that valorise meanings and feelings to promote actions that defend the interests of elderly people. Therefore, these social workers are professionals who are tasked with promoting the ‘care’ of the elderly vis-à-vis the Public Prosecutor’s Office. We suggest that they are similar to the professionals who Candace Clark (1997) calls ‘emotional brokers’: ‘emotional agents’ who assume the task of mobilizing emotions in favour of their ‘clients.’ Their work is comparable to that of other ‘agents,’ such as lawyers, charity organizers, and insurance agents who, in Clark’s view, have taken on the role in post-industrial societies of mobilizing compassion in favour of their clients (Clark, 1997).

    14The documents mentioned in this article were accessed directly at the PPO with authorization from the Public Prosecutor of the 7th Public Prosecutor’s Office for the Defence of Human Rights (Promotoria de Justiça de Defesa dos Direitos Humanos: PJDDH). In the official letter we sent to the institution, we asked for permission to consult five APs that had been initiated on behalf of elderly people who had been released from the hospital or who were dependent on outside care. Access to the PPO was authorized but consultation of the documents was restricted: we could only read the documents and take notes, but could not make photocopies or take photographs. After fieldwork began, however, the PPO relaxed their restrictions and allowed us to access a wider range of material, enabling us to learn about the situation of specific elderly people in the city and the work of the PPO.

    15We had access to three volumes of a CI and five other APs that had been initiated between 2008 and 2012. These five APs referred to elderly people who required health care and contained requests for places in Long-Stay Institutions for the Elderly made to the municipality by public prosecutors. The five APs had already been closed, meaning that some kind of ‘solution’ had been found for the cases. In three of the APs, the cases were closed because the elderly people had been accommodated in a private geriatric clinic. Another was closed because the person had gone to live in the house of a friend who promised to take care of his health, and the last one was closed because the elderly woman had died during the administrative process. As a result, we selected the material from the portion of the CI in which the AP analysed in this article is included.

    16We decided to research the CI initially because it emerged from the exact demand that interested us: requests made by the PPO for places in ILPIs for elderly people who needed post-hospital healthcare or lived in a situation of ‘social risk,’ dependency, and/or vulnerability. This CI involved the relations between government institutions and elderly people themselves in this context. We also observed connections between the elderly people, their families, the Municipal Departments and the PPO. This allowed us to learn about the denunciations, the actors and government institutions involved, the recurrence of similar cases and the tensions between health and social care policies over the question of institutionalization– tensions that directly affect the everyday life of elderly people considered dependent and/or vulnerable.

    17As observed previously, the APs studied here concern elderly people who need healthcare, shelter and social care. After receiving the denunciations, the PPO first attempts to find the family. If unable to locate the person’s family or if the family does not accept responsibility for the elderly person, the PPO requests a space for the elderly person in an ILPI from the Departments of the Porto Alegre Municipal Council. The social workers are the professionals responsible for direct support of the cases from the opening of the AP to its closure. Also, as mentioned throughout this article, they compose the ‘social assessments’ contained in each AP. Social workers followed up on the case analysed in this article for almost two years through telephone contacts, interviews with the elderly person, family, and neighbours, information from other social workers and healthcare professionals, official letters to the Municipal Departments, home visits, and visits to the 24 hour-mental health Outpatient Unit.

    Social assessments and the construction of reality

    18As an instrument of intervention, ‘social assessments’ comprise a complex mechanism that must account for a dynamic reality, although it is presented in a finalized document. In this way, the life history of a person is told through multiple entries in a type of field diary, in which social workers record observations from home visits and interviews. In these narratives, indirect discourse prevails – “the neighbour said that,” “the elderly woman could not say” – with some exceptions in which the dialogue of an interviewee (elderly person, family member, neighbour, healthcare professional) appears verbatim. In this section, we will discuss ‘social assessments’ not only as constructed realities that are gradually organized and updated over the time, but also as realities constructed through different discourses.

    19In the AP analysed here, we shall highlight the story of Neli, an elderly woman who lived alone in a house next door to her son and daughter-in-law. Neli was 74 years old when the AP was launched after denunciations of maltreatment by family members.8

    20The document states that on the first home visit, the representatives of the Public Prosecutor’s Office “were greeted by the elderly woman who was alone.” The account continues by highlighting observed elements, smells and sensations provoked in the visitors:

    The gate, closed on the outside with wire, was opened by the representatives with the neighbour’s help. She [the elderly woman] was wearing warm clothing and exuded a foetid odour of urine. The smell of the house made staying in the location unbearable. There were urine stains on the carpet and a bucket of urine next to the sofa where she stays [day and night].

    21As can be perceived, the account seeks to include elements that enable the reconstruction of the dramatic situation of the elderly woman by the PPO. The appeal to the sensory dimension, which will be discussed in the next section, is a form of painting the picture of Neli’s life.

    22Elsewhere, the text emphasizes Neli’s difficulties in taking care of herself and her home, regarding activities such as sleeping, feeding herself, or washing:

    The elderly woman sleeps on the sofa. The oven has no gas bottle due to the risk of her setting fire to the house. The daughter-in-law said that she provides ready-made meals for her to eat. In terms of hygiene, she refuses to be washed. The daughter-in-law only bathes her when the elderly woman’s son is present. They collect the containers in which she relieves herself inside the house. She does not use the outside toilet and does not allow her to clean the house.

    23As Neli was the focal point of the intervention, all the observations are naturally linked to her. However, focusing on her actions – what she does (sleeps on the sofa), what she does not do (she refuses to wash herself, she does not use the bathroom and she does not allow anyone to clean the house) and what she could do (accidentally set fire to the house) – largely conceals the deeper conditions of precarity and inequality in different ways of growing old in Brazil.9

    24The report tells us that when the denunciation was made, it mentioned the ‘disappearance’ of the elderly woman, along with her reappearance two days later at a health centre, unable to explain how she had arrived there. It is this ‘disappearance’ that the account turns to next:

    The daughter-in-law appeared and mentioned her disappearance and the current state of her health. Hearing the daughter-in-law mention the son’s intention to take her to a clinic, [Neli] raised her tone and said firmly: “I’m not going to be put into care anywhere. I want to stay in my home. I know how to care of myself, I know how to make my own food.”

    25This is one of two exceptional passages that contain Neli’s own voice, in which she asserts her wish to remain in her home and reveals her perception of herself as someone with autonomy. The report also tells us that the daughter-in-law showed documents referring her elderly mother-in-law to a psychiatrist and an assessment signed by the medic that contained the following information: “Chronic alcoholic, relays incoherent accounts, talks to herself, sees dead relatives and drinks every day, auditory hallucinations during abstinence.”

    26The motives that led the elderly woman to be taken to a mental health consultation are unknown, nor will we speculate on this event in this article. However, it is notable that multiple actors – the son, the daughter-in-law, the neighbours, and various healthcare professionals – provide information on Neli, but she rarely speaks for herself. Drawing from the ideas of Bruno Latour (1997) on the erasure of the place of enunciation as a way of establishing scientific truth, we can suggest that the ‘truth’ about Neli is constructed precisely through the reduced presence of her voice and the simultaneous use of indirect discourse. Furthermore, listening to other actors and using indirect discourse in the text not only provide secondary testimony but permanently raise doubts about Neli’s capacities and the legitimacy of her wishes. We can observe that the ‘truth’ about Neli is constructed through the economic use of her voice, such that the occasional registration of her speech. While it could have been proof of her lucidity, it actually does the reverse– in other words, it calls into question her credibility, precisely due to the fact that she is the agent of enunciation. The scant presence of Neli’s perceptions and wishes, evident in the valorisation of the voice of other people in the ‘social report,’ indicates a specific way of promoting the ‘care’ of the elderly person on the part of the social workers. However, as we discuss in our final considerations, this way of promoting ‘care’ can put the entire effort of these professionals at risk.

    27Along these lines, we can also observe that family members listed the medications offered to Neli but social workers observed that “the blister packs shown were still full and the elderly woman did not appear to be under the effect of any medication.” However, the report does not contain any dialogue with Neli about this matter. We cannot tell whether the packs were full because she did not want to take the pills, had forgotten to take them, or the medications had collateral effects. Perhaps the pills needed to be taken with foods that she did not have or would have been unable to cook on the stove given there was no gas supply. Perhaps the absence of this information was due to a lack of interest in recording her disposition in relation to the medications.

    28The report does, however, show a considerable investment in establishing Neli’s interest in alcoholic drinks. This can be seen in various conversations that revolve around this issue, including accounts from family members saying that “the elderly woman asks for rum [cachaça]” and the psychiatric report stating that she is a “chronic alcoholic.” However, it is important to note that this habit is not exclusive to Neli. Other people involved in the elderly woman’s life also make heavy use of alcoholic drinks. This is indicated at various moments. For example, the following passage comments on the use of alcohol by the son, accompanied by his intention to have Neli admitted and his justification for doing so: “The son arrived to talk smelling of alcohol. He reiterated his intention to have his mother admitted, because she spends a lot of time alone.” The report then goes on to reveal the advice given to him by the social workers: “[…] With the resistance of the elderly woman, the representatives of the PPO advised the son to ask the Public Defender’s Office for compulsory admission.”

    29A patient record produced by a mental health Outpatient Unit and accessed by the social workers contains the following psychological/psychiatric evaluation: “Patient has drunk since birth, memory lapses, loss of documents, temporal-spatial disorientation. Lives at the back of the son’s house, continues to drink. Alcoholic dementia. Referred to neurologist.”

    30It is difficult not to speculate on the expression “has drunk since birth” given that its meaning cannot be taken literally. In a metaphorical sense, it may imply a long time, referring to a habit deeply rooted in Neli’s life. It may also be an attempt to associate Neli’s condition with a genetic inheritance or the behaviour of an alcoholic mother or father, which would also be consistent with other references to an excessive use of alcohol by other family members: “the brother who supplied her with alcohol was expelled from the home” and the son and daughter-in-law, when they drink, hide the alcohol from her.

    31This characterization of Neli and her family as alcoholic is one of the most recurrent aspects of the report. Indeed, it will form the basis of the argument for compulsory admission, as will be seen later, despite the fact that the second and final time when Neli’s voice appears in the report, she opposes this idea, stating: “If I don’t drink, I’ll die anyway.”

    32In the AP, Neli’s case takes up more than 100 pages and in addition to the account of the visits, also contains photographs and records of e-mails and letters pertaining to the case. At the end of the AP, the social workers present the following conclusions:

    Care network was mobilized (health and social care), 12 months of follow-up support, did not leave the risk situation, was considered incapable of performing actions of civil life. Situation worsened, lives in subhuman conditions. Carers (couple) are no longer able to provide care or assume responsibility (all alcoholics).

    Judicial measure for compulsory admission for detoxification and judicial authorization for the elderly woman to be sheltered in a geriatric institution, even against her own will. Municipality responsible for providing a place.

    33The report next tells us that Neli was effectively admitted for a period of one month. After another two months spent in hospital, the case history is updated with the following information:

    After admission, the elderly woman did not go to the shelter despite the request having been legally granted. Reassessment of the situation. Verification warrant (issued on the same date) determines that the PPO Social Worker will visit the elderly woman’s house.

    34The social worker returns to Neli’s house and concludes:

    No alteration in the social and economic context. Elderly woman remains in a situation of social risk, still consumes alcoholic drink, eschews health treatment and the family members are unable to change the context.

    35The updates to Neli’s case that appear in the final section of the report testify to the worsening of her situation. Although she had been admitted for a month and the request for sheltered accommodation had been judicially granted, Neli returned home and resumed her habit of consuming alcohol, and did not follow the prescribed health treatment. Furthermore, the social workers emphasized, there was “no alteration in the social and economic context.”

    The work of the emotions and the defence of the rights of the elderly

    36Neli’s case is not the only one in the CI we observed. Along with other APs and a Public Civil Lawsuit, it comprises a type of dossier that calls for recognition of and attention to the broader social dimension of the problem of dependent elderly people. In the final part of the social workers’ assessments, we can note the repetition of the assertion that “the social situation of the elderly person is similar to that of many others” living in the municipality and that “the public authorities have failed to guarantee the rights of elderly people who need assisted living.” This becomes clearer still in the aforementioned Civil Public Lawsuit contained in Vol. I. of the CI, in which the social workers make their request as follows: “society calls for a solution to the problem, leaving the Public Prosecutor’s Office with no option but the present legal remedy” of obliging the municipality to make available a service with 50 places to shelter elderly people who are dependent and/or in a situation of ‘social risk.’

    37We previously remarked that the ‘social report’ produced by the social workers aims to “influence the decision of the Public Prosecutors” (Nascimento, 2012: 50), or, in other words, to convince the PPO to take a particular action. In the case in question, the action is based on the right of the elderly person to receive care in a long-stay institution. This is not a minor issue; according to the Statute of the Elderly (Brazil, 2003), institutionalization is not the best option, the preference being to support families to enable them to care for their elderly relatives. In other words, the ‘social report’ on Neli’s case must show that Neli is dependent and that her family is unable to care for her.

    38Given the aspects cited above, the ‘social report’ is a key element in the strategy of ‘influencing’ the PPO to take an action that fills the gap left by non-existent public policy. It is a technical report that needs to present ‘objective’ data, but is constructed by public sector agents in their own technical language with the aim of producing a certain emotional effect in other readers, to produce an impact capable of eliciting action. This is why we suggest that the social workers act as ‘emotional brokers’ who mobilize emotions to ‘influence’ public prosecutors.

    39In her book The Cultural Politics of Emotion, Sara Ahmed (2014) traces the etymology of the word ‘emotion’ from the Latin emovere, signifying “to move” or “to move out.” For the author, emotions do not pertain to subjects or objects. It is their circulation that creates surfaces and shapes social and individual bodies (Ahmed, 2014).10 Unlike the model of emotional contagion, which claims that emotions pass from one individual to another through contact, the author suggests that “emotions work by working through signs and on bodies to materialise the surfaces and boundaries that are lived as worlds” (Ahmed, 2014: 191).

    40Inspired by the ideas of Judith Butler, the author claims that emotions are performative, as explained in the extract below, where she presents an overview of her book with examples on racism and emotions:

    Throughout this book, I have considered examples of racism as a particular form of contact between others. A white racist subject who encounters a racial other may experience an intensity of emotions (fear, hate, disgust, pain). That intensification involves moving away from the body of the other, or moving towards that body in an act of violence, and then moving away. The ‘moment of contact’ is shaped by past histories of contact, which allows the proximity of a racial other to be perceived as threatening, at the same time as it reshapes the bodies in the contact zone of the encounter. These histories have already impressed upon the surface of the bodies at the same time as they create new impressions. So while emotions may be experienced as ‘inside out’ or ‘outside in’, they actually work to generate the distinction between inside and outside, partly by rehearsing associations that are already in place. I have thus described emotions as performative: they both generate their objects, and repeat past associations […]. The loop of the performative works powerfully: in reading the other as being disgusting, for example, the subject is filled up with disgust, as a sign of the truth of the reading (Ahmed, 2014: 194)

    41Following Ahmed’s lead, this section looks to reflect on the way in which Neli is characterized as a dependent elderly woman whose family is unable to provide care, leaving the Public Prosecutor’s Office to decide her fate. It is this decision that the ‘social report’ seeks to influence by endeavouring to elicit specific emotions like sympathy.

    42One aspect that needs to be addressed is that the report does not name any emotions, which might suggest that it is mistaken to take them as the focus of this analysis. However, we cannot lose sight of the fact that it is a technical report— that is, a type of document idealized as ‘objective’ and ‘rational’ and therefore incompatible with any open expression of emotions.

    43Thus, the challenge posed to ‘emotional brokers’ in the production of the ‘social report’ is to invoke certain emotions without naming them and without assuming an openly emotional tone. In the situation presented in the previous section, which describes the arrival of the social workers to Neli’s home, it is implied that the elderly woman was locked inside the plot of land where her house is situated. Although this is not made explicit textually, it becomes clear in the description of the “gate closed from the outside by wire,” which was opened with the help of neighbours. The image of the gate shut on the outside, combined with the help of neighbours – and not friends or family – to open it evokes a scene with dual dramatic elements: victimization (implicit in the act of locking her in) and solitude (implicit in the absence of the family/the help of the neighbors). What were the reasons for this imprisonment? Could the elderly woman’s own behaviour be understood as a ‘cause’ of her isolation, making her ‘responsible’ for her situation?

    44To reflect on these questions, we return to Clark’s work in which she discusses social rules and the dynamics of sympathy that entangle those who offer it and those who receive it in myriad ways. Among the implicit rules that compose the emotional grammar of sympathy, Clark highlights ‘moral worth’ as a factor that influences the probability of obtaining sympathy. People perceived as victims of the ‘system’ or ‘fate’ – those affected by disease, disability, or disaster, for example – are more deserving of sympathy than those who are perceived as responsible for their misfortune due to behaviours considered irresponsible or inadequate. As Clark writes: “The sympathy a person feels is contingent on where on the luck-responsibility continuum he or she assigns the other’s problem” (Clark, 1987: 124).

    45However, it is worth emphasizing that conceptions of (bad) luck/fate and responsibility are influenced by diverse factors and are not static. Examples of this include conditions like ‘depression,’ ‘alcoholism,’ and ‘propensity to violence,’ whose causes, rather than being attributed to the individual’s bad behaviour, are now conceived within certain circles as genetic or the result of ‘traumas.’ In this case, the ‘emotional brokers’ may play a fundamental role in constructing ‘cases’ so that the position on the continuum between luck and responsibility is altered.

    46In Neli’s case, the ‘social report’ clearly attempts to mobilize sympathy, using visual and sensory elements to indicate her unsuitability to living in the ‘normal’ world:

    1. Neli is indifferent to her warm clothing exuding a smell of urine (“She [the elderly woman] was wearing warm clothing and exuded a foetid odour of urine.”);

    2. She does not find the foetid smell intolerable (“The smell of the house made staying in the location unbearable”);

    3. The carpet stains do not bother her (“There were urine stains on the carpet”);

    4. Nor is she repulsed by the bucket of urine placed by her side (“a bucket of urine next to the sofa where she stays [day and night].”).

    47The question of hygiene and cleanliness continues to be emphasized in the next part of the report, as mentioned in the excepts transcribed in the second section of this article. The short phrases denote objects that appear out of synch with their ‘normal’ functions. The sofa, meant for sitting, is where Neli sleeps; without a bottle of gas, the oven loses its function, which is why ready-made food must be brought to Neli by her daughter-in-law; the bathroom is not used to bathe or for her biological needs, which she meets using ‘containers’ inside the house. The disorder provoked by the objects and their ‘out of place’ functions (Douglas, 1991), combined with the fact that the elderly woman “refuses to be washed” and “does not allow the house to be cleaned,” mobilizes disgust and configures Neli as a repulsive person, someone to avoid being near. Even though the disgust of the visitors is not made explicit, that feeling is certainly evoked by the description.

    48Not only are the objects separated from their functions, but they make “staying in the location unbearable” for the social workers—especially the ‘out of place’ urine on her clothing, on the carpet, and in the bucket next to the sofa that also doubles as the elderly woman’s bed. Here we can turn to the work of José Carlos Rodrigues (1979) where he discusses systems of classifying the world that form taboos related to the human body. Echoing some of Mary Douglas’ ideas, the author situates disgust as a problematic related to disorganization and lack of control of objects that evade certain dualities including ‘nature’ and ‘culture,’ ‘inside’ and ‘outside,’ and ‘ingestion’ and excretion,’ as expressed in the passage below:

    The interior/exterior opposition is essential to understanding the problematic of disgust, since the products of the body are not disgusting to the same degree when they present a ‘natural’ Nature, that is, properly set in their place and controlled by the body’s own biological organization. What is really and extremely dangerous is displaced Nature, secretion, which is Natural, but occupies an exterior space reserved for Culture. What especially repulses is the ambiguity of these products that man has produced but cannot control. The ‘interior,’ by itself, is not necessarily dangerous (so long as it is the seat of the soul, or consciousness). What is dangerous is its action, its uncontrolled manifestation, its invasion of the culturally-controlled world (it is not, for instance, polite to open one’s mouth to show one’s throat, or rinse fruit in the bathroom sink, since the effect is the opposite of purificatory due to the inversion in the direction of the axis of the ingestion v. excretion opposition). (Rodrigues, 1979: 164)

    49The well-known work of William Miller (1997) also situates repugnance caused by certain elements and situations as a problematic in the context of categories of classification. In the opening chapter of his book The Anatomy of Disgust, Miller reflects on the story of Darwin’s disgust. He wonders what the motive was for the repulsion felt both by the naturalist and the naked ‘savage’ from Tierra del Fuego, when the latter touched a piece of cold meat with his fingers that Darwin was about to eat. For Miller, the chief explanation lies in the categories of tactility (hot v. cold, soft v. hard), of purity (cooked v. raw, clean v. dirty), of bodily shame (naked v. dressed) and those defining belonging (England v. Tierra del Fuego, us v. them) which mobilized both subjects and produced the mutual feeling of disgust.

    50Ahmed (2014) discusses the same story to highlight the relations between disgust and power. The disgust that produces and reinforces hierarchies between the ‘superior’ and the ‘inferior’ is also the disgust that makes the superior vulnerable, because the possibility of being affected by the ‘inferior’ also demonstrates weakness. As Miller writes:

    The world is a dangerous place in which the polluting powers of the low are stronger than the purifying powers of the high. Rozin quotes a mechanic who captures this point vividly: “A teaspoon of sewage will spoil a barrel of wine, but a teaspoon of wine will do nothing for a barrel of sewage.” (Miller, 1997: 9)

    51In this sense, disgust is doubly dangerous, due to both the aversion it provokes and the threat it poses. Hence the object of disgust must be shunned. Therefore, in Neli’s case, we suggest that the same work performed by the circulation of disgust that casts her as a repulsive person in the account also indicates the need to transfer her to a sheltered care institution far from her family.

    52There is also another aspect of disgust emphasized by Miller and Ahmed concerning the ambiguity of disgust and its capacity to provoke aversion and attraction simultaneously. Even if momentary, the attraction towards that which is repulsive becomes evident, for example, in the difficulty of looking away from a horror scene or disguising one’s hyperattention to abject bodies, excrement and other bodily fluids. This ambiguous relation with disgust can also be perceived in the ‘social report.’ In it we can observe the valorisation of repugnant elements – smells, images (stains) and objects (excrement) – whose association with Neli attests to her unsuitability to living with family members. It is a clear example of attraction towards the repulsive.

    53Appeals to the senses also appear in the report’s description of Neli’s family and their inability to care for her. As mentioned previously, the PPO supports the Statute of the Elderly’s assessment that the family is the ideal environment for providing care to the elderly. In the social workers’ account, more impactful than the son’s declaration of his intention to admit his mother is his “smell of alcohol” in reinforcing the family’s incapacity to provide care. The odour, though it cannot be smelt by the reader of the report, appears as proof of the alcoholism embodied by the family.

    54The smells – of urine, of alcohol – that populate the ‘social report’ merit attention, especially when we consider the fact that, since they are invisible and silent, the only way to record their presence is through the testimony of those who perceive them. As remarked earlier, the ‘social report’ is a key document that, as a technical report that tells Neli’s story, must record both objective data, such as the house gate locked from the outside, and subjective data, such as the odours perceived by visitors.

    55It is worth remembering here that olfactory perception is far being a ‘natural’ capacity of humans, a question discussed by Alan Corbin (1986) in his work on the history of olfactory perception. In this work, Corbin connects the refinement of olfactory sensibility with the social transformations that occurred in eighteenth and nineteenth-century France, including the intensification of control over bodies and spaces. According to Corbin, the success of these sensory transformations was also boosted by the diffusion of miasma theory, which held that diseases derived from contact with clouds of foetid smells, called miasmas, coming from the remains of dead bodies and other decomposing matter. In this context, new deodorisation techniques emerged and were implemented, with an emphasis on road paving, drainage, ventilation, disinfection, and reduction in the population density in urban spaces. These measures were part of emerging broad sanitary reform movements, whose moral significance spread throughout the social fabric, reinforcing hierarchical relations between different sections of the population.

    56Aside from the author’s immersive study of a highly original sociohistorical problem in the history of sensibilities, what appears as particularly relevant to us in Corbin’s work on ‘knowledge and odours’ are the relationships between the sensory, the emotional, the technical, and the political in the transformation of everyday life. He claims that when pneumatic chemists began studying odours in detail, a transformation in sentiments related to particular smells took place, which influenced how bodies were governed through norms that redefined urban and domestic spatialities. In other words, Corbin demonstrates that the transformation of reality is the outcome of the combined work of contemporary knowledge concerning ‘airs,’ refinements in olfactory sensibility, an increased intolerance of the repugnant, and the State’s action through its ‘tactics’ of deodorisation and hygiene.

    57Turning to Neli’s case in light of Corbin’s study, something quite similar can be suggested. The recommendation of admission to sheltered care, the result of a government policy that removes the undesirable from ‘normal’ social life, is the outcome of the ‘impact’ caused by the technical evaluation in conjunction with the work of the senses. This operates through the denunciation of odours and emotional work, realized by the disgust present in the process of seeking compassion and sympathy.

    Final considerations

    58As an administrative document that forms part of an AP, the ‘social report’ must provide a succinct view of the reality in question. It constitutes an account constructed in an apparently distanced manner that aims to present Neli’s situation ‘objectively,’ making recurrent use of the passive voice and the third person to compose an image of reality. Although it does not contain explicitly emotional expressions, this report tells a dramatic story of everyday life and describes a private world that makes the reader feel ‘moved’ by the situation. Word choice, narrative style, and the selected protagonists produce a sensory approximation of the quotidian and intimate universe of the case.

    59In these final considerations, we highlight some aspects of the report as a narrative whose aim is to submit an official request designed to obtain a solution for Neli’s case.

    60Firstly, as already mentioned and problematized from the outset, one of the features that stands out is the scant presence of the voice of the elderly woman herself in the report. Although Neli’s voice is not taken into consideration in the conclusion of the report, it is also not completely absent throughout. Her voice is registered twice; first when the elderly woman explains that she is already very old and adds: “If I don’t drink, I’ll die anyway,” and again when she says vehemently: “I’m not going to be put into care anywhere. I want to stay in my home. I know how to care for myself, I know how to make my own food.” We are not as concerned with determining why the voice of the person who is the focus of the report is barely represented. Rather, we ask why her voice is sufficiently important to be registered but not important enough to be considered in the decision about her fate.

    61One potential response to this question is found in the tension between the ‘right to autonomy’ and ‘independence’ present in the National Policy for the Health of the Elderly Person (Brazil 2006) and the ‘right to care.’ This tension, in Neli’s case, appears clearly in the construction of the AP. On one hand, the report contains Neli’s voice when she argues that she knows how to care for herself and thus intends to remain ‘autonomous’ and ‘independent,’ which converges with the National Policy. In this way, Neli demands the ‘right to autonomy.’ On the other hand, the report demonstrates – through testimonies of third parties about Neli and accounts of the deplorable state of her home – that she has cognitive and behavioural limitations that make it necessary to invoke the ‘right to care.’

    62The Active Aging Policy (WHO, 2005), which forms part of the National Policy for the Health of the Elderly Person (Brazil, 2006), is based on the ideal of ‘autonomy’ and ‘independence’ and suggests that elderly people should strive to be ‘healthy,’ motivated, and integrated in different aspects of social life in order to have a positive impact on their quality and quantity of life— a theme also expressed in the title of the booklet “Living well until over 100 years.” Neli’s case points to the limits of this proposal since the duty of maintaining a ‘healthy’ lifestyle may signify the loss of the right to decide about one’s own notions of living well, problematizing the conception of ‘autonomy’ and ‘independence’ as rights. Furthermore, accepting the logic of the ‘right to care’ proposed by social workers means accepting the condition of dependency as a prerequisite for mobilizing the resources available through social care policies, as well as legal resources related to ‘protective measures.’ Legal resources include requests for the State to assume wardship, compulsory hospitalization for detoxification, and institutionalization.

    63A second significant aspect regarding the ‘social report’ as a narrative relates to the authors of the report. The social workers responsible for its production engage in the careful process of working cases, which may involve years of contacts, visits, and research using diverse sources in order to explain the situations of people concerned at risk or socially vulnerable. They also ultimately submit demands to the PPO. In this sense, they are fundamental actors, considering that the very existence and life circumstances of the people involved depend on the way in which they are depicted in this report, which informs and supports the public prosecutor’s decision on the type of care to be afforded to them. Given the tension between the ‘right to autonomy’ and the ‘right to care,’ deciding in favour of one or the other lies in the hands of the social workers and their capacity to ‘impact’ public prosecutors. This is why we argue that they perform the role of ‘emotional brokers,’ making use of narrative resources to mobilize emotions and influence the transformation of reality. Pursuing this argument, we called attention to the third aspect of the narrative, relating to the emotions evoked and their effects on the case outcome.

    64Taking inspiration from Ahmed’s work, the circulation of emotions has the capacity to create surfaces and shape social and individual bodies. In Neli’s case, the initial description of her home as a repulsive place filled with the smell and stains of urine comes to signify the elderly woman as someone unable to take care of herself. This is highly relevant given the effect of disqualifying her and her voice when she expresses her desires and her views concerning her own capacities. In this case, the disgust set in motion through potent ‘objective’ accounts collides with the recognition of Neli as a person deserving or undeserving of sympathy.

    65As Clark argues, “feeling sympathy and exchanging it, rather than being ‘natural’ or random phenomena, are patterned interactions shaped by cultural and social factors” (Clark, 1997: 16). In other words, a series of implicit social and logical rules dictate the feeling and reception of sympathy. Elements that motivate sympathy include unexpected and unsolicited life events that result in harm and/or loss for the unfortunate subject—solitude and sickness, for example. In Neli’s case, solitude appears at the start of the account through the image of the locked gate, which suggests her isolation, and the fact she was found ‘alone at home’ by the visitors. Sickness, specifically mental illness, appears multiple times in medical and psychiatric reports. This includes the report establishing that she “has drunk since birth,” linking the habit to a misfortune in her life when interpreted as a genetic or behavioural inheritance. However, as we subsequently remarked, this fact does not seem enough to exempt her from ‘responsibility’ for consuming alcohol in excess. Other factors work against her, like the fact that she refuses medical treatment and explicitly challenges the principle of valorising life at any cost when she declares that irrespective of any attitude she takes, she will die anyway.

    66Solitude, sympathy, and disgust combine to form the emotional framework of the ‘social report’ and portray Neli as a solitary and sick person and ‘impacts’ the PPO, which determines that she has the ‘right to care.’ In this case, ‘care’ takes the form of ‘compulsory admission,’ initially in a detoxification clinic and followed by a long-stay geriatric institution, “albeit against her will.” In other words, it is a form of ‘care’ that implies the complete denial of her ‘right to autonomy.’

    67This outcome suggests a second response to the presence of Neli’s voice in the report: her claim to the ‘right to autonomy’ is ‘proof’ of her need for the ‘right to care.’ That is, the recorded testimony of her voice – when she claims to know how to care for herself and when she dismisses the principle of valorising life – are fundamental pieces of evidence that demonstrate her incapacity to distinguish right from wrong. Through the micropolitical work of the emotions, therefore, the decision in favour of the ‘right to care’ puts Neli in her ‘proper’ place, re-establishing the hierarchy of knowledge and power.

    68Nonetheless, as Clark (1987, 1997), Rezende and Coelho (2010), and others have pointed out, this emotional micropolitics can also disturb social places and the frameworks of power through escape strategies for evading the pre-established hierarchies. The final entries in Neli’s case file show that she was admitted for a period of one month and assured a place in a long-stay geriatric institution. However, as the report also notes, she did not accept the place in the long-stay facility, once more asserting authority over her own life.

    69All of this allows us to suggest that this form of promoting the ‘care’ of this elderly woman as constructed in the ‘social report’ undermines the efforts of the professionals themselves, given that the ending is merely a return to the beginning of the process: “Reassessment of the situation. Verification warrant (issued on the same date) determines that the PPO Social Worker will visit the elderly woman’s house.”

    Bibliographie

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    Notes de bas de page

    1 For her comments and suggestions, we thank Maria Cláudia Coelho, without whom it would have been impossible to develop various arguments contained in this article.

    2 The ‘health centre’ cited here is the Family Health Strategy (Estratégia de Saúde da Família: ESF) Unit of Vila Jardim, which forms part of the Conceição Hospital Group (Grupo Hospitalar Conceição: GHC) in Porto Alegre. The situation related in the text occurred during fieldwork conducted by the article’s second author for her PhD thesis, “‘Living well until over 100’: aging, health and public policies for the elderly in Brazil” (Siqueira, 2014). The above story was later published in the book Corpo e saúde na mira da Antropologia: ontologias, práticas, traduções (Siqueira & Víctora, 2015).

    3 Porto Alegre is also the capital with the highest number of elderly people living alone. According to IBGE (2010), the number of people living alone has increased over recent years (6.9 million one-person households). When broken down by age group, we can note a higher number of women aged 60 or over living alone. Among the 20 cities with the highest percentage of one-person households with elderly people, four are in Rio Grande do Sul, the capital city among them.

    4 Especially the Active Aging Policy. See WHO (2005).

    5 Activities of daily living include eating, bathing, toileting, grooming, walking from one room to another on the same floor and lying down. Instrumental activities of daily life include, for example, shopping (for food, clothes, medications and so on), money management, taking medications and using transport.

    6 The Civil Inquiry is an investigatory administrative procedure, specifically consisting of an inquiry initiated, lead, and, where applicable, closed exclusively by the Public Prosecutor’s Office. Technically, it is not a trial since accusations are not made, nor are sanctions or penalties applied. Its objective is to collect information and investigate harm caused to people, groups, public and social property and so on, in order to protect the collective or diffuse interests/rights within its remit. The CI in question consists of three volumes containing a number of APs, a Public Civil Lawsuit and other documents, and was initated due to the recurrence of complaints and demands for places in Long Stay Institutions for the Elderly (Instituições de Longa Permanência para Idosos: ILPI).

    7 The Public Prosecutor’s Office works to defend citizenship and human rights. Its prosecutors deal with issues in diverse areas and institutions, including questions relating to health and social welfare, the rights of elderly and disabled people, the right to freedom from racial or sexual discrimination, or the right to education. In Porto Alegre, there are around thirty Public Prosecutor’s Offices, among them the Public Prosecutor’s Office for the Defence of Human Rights (Promotoria de Justiça de Defesa dos Direitos Humanos: PJDDH) of Porto Alegre, responsible for safeguarding the human rights of the elderly (Siqueira, 2014).

    8 As detailed in the report, there was a denunciation, whose authorship is not recorded in the AP, that the family was failing to provide care for the elderly woman and that she was suffering from ‘maltreatment.’ Following the visit, the social workers concluded that the entire context was highly problematic and that the family lacked the capacity to take care of the elderly woman. It is observable, therefore, that the ‘maltreatment’ that formed part of the initial denunciation leading the PPO to Neli’s home ceased to be the main focus of the problem and the social workers began to expound on the needs of Neli, whose family members had shown themselves unable to provide adequate care.

    9 A distanced reading of the account would allow more general considerations about the social and economic context of Neli’s old age and how the difficulties described in the report are not related to her own personal issues but to domestic infrastructural problems. In other words, if we shift focus to the environment in which Neli lives, we can perceive that her home’s installations are completely inadequate for an elderly person. Although the description centres on Neli’s actions, the problem in question is not Neli’s behaviour but rather her home, which lacks an inside bathroom or a kitchen appropriate to her particular needs. Given these facts, although it eludes somewhat the scope of the question being analysed, it seems reasonable to ask whether the foetid smell, the carpet stains and the containers in which she relieves herself are not a direct consequence of the absence of a bathroom easily accessible by her; whether her refusal to wash is not related, in addition to the difficulty of reaching the outside bathroom, to a possible discomfort, or feeling of shame, over having to undress and be touched by her daughter-in-law and son; and whether the house being cleaned by other people is not perceived by her as something akin to an invasion, or worse, as a fact that could be used against her, since it would attest to her incapacity to care for her own things.

    10 Ahmed notes that in saying that emotions circulate, she is not associating herself with the emotional contagion model. Although the contagion model may be valuable for indicating that emotions are located in the individual, it is mistaken to imagine that emotions pass from one person to another like an object. For her, this view risks transforming emotion into a transmissible property (something that is passed on), as though it were possible to pass on the same thing (Ahmed, 2014: 10).

    Auteurs

    • Ceres Víctora
    • Monalisa Dias de Siqueira
    Précédent Suivant
    Table des matières

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    João de Pina Cabral

    1991

    A Missão

    A Missão

    Jorge Freitas Branco et Luísa Tiago de Oliveira

    1993

    A Colecção

    A Colecção

    Jorge Freitas Branco et Luísa Tiago de Oliveira

    1994

    Elites

    Elites

    Choice, Leadership and Succession

    João de Pina Cabral et Antónia Pedroso de Lima (dir.)

    2000

    A Rua

    A Rua

    espaço, tempo, sociabilidade

    Graça Índias Cordeiro et Frédéric Vidal (dir.)

    2008

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    1 For her comments and suggestions, we thank Maria Cláudia Coelho, without whom it would have been impossible to develop various arguments contained in this article.

    2 The ‘health centre’ cited here is the Family Health Strategy (Estratégia de Saúde da Família: ESF) Unit of Vila Jardim, which forms part of the Conceição Hospital Group (Grupo Hospitalar Conceição: GHC) in Porto Alegre. The situation related in the text occurred during fieldwork conducted by the article’s second author for her PhD thesis, “‘Living well until over 100’: aging, health and public policies for the elderly in Brazil” (Siqueira, 2014). The above story was later published in the book Corpo e saúde na mira da Antropologia: ontologias, práticas, traduções (Siqueira & Víctora, 2015).

    3 Porto Alegre is also the capital with the highest number of elderly people living alone. According to IBGE (2010), the number of people living alone has increased over recent years (6.9 million one-person households). When broken down by age group, we can note a higher number of women aged 60 or over living alone. Among the 20 cities with the highest percentage of one-person households with elderly people, four are in Rio Grande do Sul, the capital city among them.

    4 Especially the Active Aging Policy. See WHO (2005).

    5 Activities of daily living include eating, bathing, toileting, grooming, walking from one room to another on the same floor and lying down. Instrumental activities of daily life include, for example, shopping (for food, clothes, medications and so on), money management, taking medications and using transport.

    6 The Civil Inquiry is an investigatory administrative procedure, specifically consisting of an inquiry initiated, lead, and, where applicable, closed exclusively by the Public Prosecutor’s Office. Technically, it is not a trial since accusations are not made, nor are sanctions or penalties applied. Its objective is to collect information and investigate harm caused to people, groups, public and social property and so on, in order to protect the collective or diffuse interests/rights within its remit. The CI in question consists of three volumes containing a number of APs, a Public Civil Lawsuit and other documents, and was initated due to the recurrence of complaints and demands for places in Long Stay Institutions for the Elderly (Instituições de Longa Permanência para Idosos: ILPI).

    7 The Public Prosecutor’s Office works to defend citizenship and human rights. Its prosecutors deal with issues in diverse areas and institutions, including questions relating to health and social welfare, the rights of elderly and disabled people, the right to freedom from racial or sexual discrimination, or the right to education. In Porto Alegre, there are around thirty Public Prosecutor’s Offices, among them the Public Prosecutor’s Office for the Defence of Human Rights (Promotoria de Justiça de Defesa dos Direitos Humanos: PJDDH) of Porto Alegre, responsible for safeguarding the human rights of the elderly (Siqueira, 2014).

    8 As detailed in the report, there was a denunciation, whose authorship is not recorded in the AP, that the family was failing to provide care for the elderly woman and that she was suffering from ‘maltreatment.’ Following the visit, the social workers concluded that the entire context was highly problematic and that the family lacked the capacity to take care of the elderly woman. It is observable, therefore, that the ‘maltreatment’ that formed part of the initial denunciation leading the PPO to Neli’s home ceased to be the main focus of the problem and the social workers began to expound on the needs of Neli, whose family members had shown themselves unable to provide adequate care.

    9 A distanced reading of the account would allow more general considerations about the social and economic context of Neli’s old age and how the difficulties described in the report are not related to her own personal issues but to domestic infrastructural problems. In other words, if we shift focus to the environment in which Neli lives, we can perceive that her home’s installations are completely inadequate for an elderly person. Although the description centres on Neli’s actions, the problem in question is not Neli’s behaviour but rather her home, which lacks an inside bathroom or a kitchen appropriate to her particular needs. Given these facts, although it eludes somewhat the scope of the question being analysed, it seems reasonable to ask whether the foetid smell, the carpet stains and the containers in which she relieves herself are not a direct consequence of the absence of a bathroom easily accessible by her; whether her refusal to wash is not related, in addition to the difficulty of reaching the outside bathroom, to a possible discomfort, or feeling of shame, over having to undress and be touched by her daughter-in-law and son; and whether the house being cleaned by other people is not perceived by her as something akin to an invasion, or worse, as a fact that could be used against her, since it would attest to her incapacity to care for her own things.

    10 Ahmed notes that in saying that emotions circulate, she is not associating herself with the emotional contagion model. Although the contagion model may be valuable for indicating that emotions are located in the individual, it is mistaken to imagine that emotions pass from one person to another like an object. For her, this view risks transforming emotion into a transmissible property (something that is passed on), as though it were possible to pass on the same thing (Ahmed, 2014: 10).

    Emotions and Public Policies

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    Emotions and Public Policies

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    Víctora, C., & Siqueira, M. D. de. (2023). Chapter 3: between autonomy and care: emotions and actions in defence of the rights of the elderly. In M. C. Coelho & I. Beleli (éds.), Emotions and Public Policies (1‑). Etnográfica Press. https://doi.org/10.4000/books.etnograficapress.8436
    Víctora, Ceres, et Monalisa Dias de Siqueira. « Chapter 3: Between Autonomy and Care: Emotions and Actions in Defence of the Rights of the Elderly ». In Emotions and Public Policies, édité par Maria Claudia Coelho et Iara Beleli. Lisboa: Etnográfica Press, 2023. https://doi.org/10.4000/books.etnograficapress.8436.
    Víctora, Ceres, et Monalisa Dias de Siqueira. « Chapter 3: Between Autonomy and Care: Emotions and Actions in Defence of the Rights of the Elderly ». Emotions and Public Policies, édité par Maria Claudia Coelho et Iara Beleli, Etnográfica Press, 2023, https://doi.org/10.4000/books.etnograficapress.8436.

    Référence numérique du livre

    Format

    Coelho, M. C., & Beleli, I. (éds.). (2023). Emotions and Public Policies (1‑). Etnográfica Press. https://doi.org/10.4000/books.etnograficapress.8345
    Coelho, Maria Claudia, et Iara Beleli, éd. Emotions and Public Policies. Lisboa: Etnográfica Press, 2023. https://doi.org/10.4000/books.etnograficapress.8345.
    Coelho, Maria Claudia, et Iara Beleli, éditeurs. Emotions and Public Policies. Etnográfica Press, 2023, https://doi.org/10.4000/books.etnograficapress.8345.
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