A sovereign abode – Democracy, discipline and deliberation in a Swedish housing association from 1943 to the present
(2021) SOCM04 20211Department of Sociology
Sociology
- Abstract
- Since its inception, the discipline of sociology has struggled to bridge the gap between structure and agency. How is it that individuals can be free whilst also part of a larger context that determines their actions? This study aims to make a small contribution towards solving this conundrum. It departs from the theories of Habermas, Arendt and Machiavelli, and ventures into an archival study of a Swedish housing association, chronicling how it grappled with this very issue over the eight decades of its existence. It concludes that autonomy – and the agency that follows from it – is something that has to be deliberated into being in a collective setting. It also concludes that housing associations as an organizational form, whilst... (More)
- Since its inception, the discipline of sociology has struggled to bridge the gap between structure and agency. How is it that individuals can be free whilst also part of a larger context that determines their actions? This study aims to make a small contribution towards solving this conundrum. It departs from the theories of Habermas, Arendt and Machiavelli, and ventures into an archival study of a Swedish housing association, chronicling how it grappled with this very issue over the eight decades of its existence. It concludes that autonomy – and the agency that follows from it – is something that has to be deliberated into being in a collective setting. It also concludes that housing associations as an organizational form, whilst structurally a potential site for such deliberations, do not guarantee that they take place, and that the hard-won lessons of deliberative decision-making have to be kept alive in practical use, lest they be forgotten. (Less)
- Popular Abstract
- This thesis studies the archives of a housing association (bostadsrättsförening), and analyses the history of the association in terms of freedom and necessity. Freedom is the things you want to do. Necessity is the things you have to do. By looking at how freedom and necessity log heads over the course of eight decades, the thesis comes to the conclusion that necessity has a tendency to win out over freedom, and that it takes a tremendous amount of work to get to a point where all the necessary things are done to such a degree that the freely chosen things can be done. It also takes a considerable amount of time. Learning the necessary things is a project in and of itself, and during the history of the association it often turned out to... (More)
- This thesis studies the archives of a housing association (bostadsrättsförening), and analyses the history of the association in terms of freedom and necessity. Freedom is the things you want to do. Necessity is the things you have to do. By looking at how freedom and necessity log heads over the course of eight decades, the thesis comes to the conclusion that necessity has a tendency to win out over freedom, and that it takes a tremendous amount of work to get to a point where all the necessary things are done to such a degree that the freely chosen things can be done. It also takes a considerable amount of time. Learning the necessary things is a project in and of itself, and during the history of the association it often turned out to be the only project that time allowed for. More often than not, when a board got comfortable in the role of steering the association, it resigned and replaced itself with new members, who had to learn from scratch all over again. Thus, the time for freedom never came; necessity ruled the day.
This thesis concludes that in order to assert its freedom, an organization (such as a housing association) has to have two things. The first is that it needs members who are willing to take on the roles of functionaries within the organization, such that the work gets done. The second is that the organization needs to put in place routines and a set of traditions that allow members to learn what needs to be done, and what potential freedom opens up once those things are done. Having one or the other is insufficient. Without members, nothing happens; without routines and traditions, every new generation of members have to learn everything from scratch each time. Only when the two act in concert are the domains of freedom opened, and the struggle to keep afloat turned into a project of collectively deciding what is to be done. The aim is to get to a point where everyone involved feels like they have a say in where the organization is heading, and knows how to say it in a way that makes a difference. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
http://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/9051879
- author
- Schmidt, Marcus LU
- supervisor
- organization
- course
- SOCM04 20211
- year
- 2021
- type
- H2 - Master's Degree (Two Years)
- subject
- keywords
- Autonomy, civil society, collective decision-making, freedom, Hannah Arendt, Jürgen Habermas.
- language
- English
- id
- 9051879
- date added to LUP
- 2021-06-10 09:07:42
- date last changed
- 2021-06-15 11:59:30
@misc{9051879,
abstract = {{Since its inception, the discipline of sociology has struggled to bridge the gap between structure and agency. How is it that individuals can be free whilst also part of a larger context that determines their actions? This study aims to make a small contribution towards solving this conundrum. It departs from the theories of Habermas, Arendt and Machiavelli, and ventures into an archival study of a Swedish housing association, chronicling how it grappled with this very issue over the eight decades of its existence. It concludes that autonomy – and the agency that follows from it – is something that has to be deliberated into being in a collective setting. It also concludes that housing associations as an organizational form, whilst structurally a potential site for such deliberations, do not guarantee that they take place, and that the hard-won lessons of deliberative decision-making have to be kept alive in practical use, lest they be forgotten.}},
author = {{Schmidt, Marcus}},
language = {{eng}},
note = {{Student Paper}},
title = {{A sovereign abode – Democracy, discipline and deliberation in a Swedish housing association from 1943 to the present}},
year = {{2021}},
}