Hollin, G. orcid.org/0000-0003-4348-8272 and Williams, R. orcid.org/0000-0002-4295-2582 (2022) Complicity: Methodologies of power, politics and the ethics of knowledge production. Sociology of Health & Illness, 44 (S1). pp. 1-21. ISSN 0141-9889
Abstract
In this collection we develop the concept of “complicity” as a means to understand how medical sociologists might be allied in unexpected or uncomfortable ways with dominant structures of power. After giving examples of complicity from our own research, we introduce existing scholarship on complicity, describing it as a concept that comes coupled with a sense of responsibility and that is related to, yet distinct from, a range of other terms including reflexivity, collusion, guilt, and shame. We also discuss how complicity has been described to occur at the level of the institution, within theoretical frameworks, and during mundane moments that we face on a day-to-day basis. Building on this review, we hypothesise that medical sociology – where access to fieldsites is often hard won, where “researching up” in medical and scientific institutions is common, and where our own work frequently concerns matters central to medical institutions themselves – is a discipline wherein mundane complicity is likely. Following this gathering exercise, we introduce the interventions that comprise this collection: interventions from a diversity of sociologists of health and illness who, perhaps for the first time in written form, account for how complicities of various kinds came to shape their work and how, with varying levels of success, they have sought redress. We close by offering some insight into the process of developing this collection, celebrating its successes while also acknowledging that many gaps and complicities remain.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2022 The Author. Journal compilation © 2022 Foundation for the Sociology of Health & Illness/Blackwell Publishing Ltd. This is an author-produced version of a paper subsequently published in Sociology of Health & Illness. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher's self-archiving policy. |
Keywords: | complicity; ethics; knowledge production; methodology; participatory methods; power |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Social Sciences (Sheffield) > Department of Sociological Studies (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 16 Dec 2022 10:14 |
Last Modified: | 14 Dec 2023 01:13 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Wiley |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1111/1467-9566.13575 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:194464 |