This article looks at social inclusion from a sociological perspective. It argues that sociology complements biological and other natural order explanations of social stratification. The article interrogates a variety of forms of social integration, including ostracism within 5th century b.c. Greece, 19th-century solidarism, and Goffman's mid-20th-century work on stigma. It does so to demonstrate how in each of these contexts, social inclusion and exclusion can function as apparati that problematize people on the margins, and by extension, contribute to their governance and control. The article proposes that sociology provides a valuable orientation from which to consider social inclusion because it illuminates how social integration maintains and manages the ways in which people move about and through their socially stratified worlds.
This is an article published in Journal of the International AIDS Society, available online: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.7448/IAS.16.1.17354 ; Introduction: Since 2003, US government funding to address the HIV and AIDS pandemic has been subject to an anti-prostitution clause. Simultaneously, the efficacy of some HIV prevention efforts for sex work in areas receiving US government funding has diminished. This article seeks to explain why. Methods: This analysis utilizes a case story approach to build a narrative of defining features of organizations in receipt of funding from the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and other US funding sources. For this analysis, multiple cases were compiled within a single narrative. This helps show restrictions imposed by the anti-prostitution clause, any lack of clarity of guidelines for implementation and ways some agencies, decision-making personnel, and staff on the ground contend with these restrictions. Results: Responses to PEPFAR's anti-prostitution clause vary widely and have varied over time. Organizational responses have included ending services for sex workers, gradual phase-out of services, cessation of seeking US government HIV funds and increasing isolation of sex workers. Guidance issued in 2010 did not clarify what was permitted. Implementation and enforcement has been dependent in part on the interpretations of this policy by individuals, including US government representatives and organizational staff. Conclusions: Different interpretations of the anti-prostitution clause have led to variations in programming, affecting the effectiveness of work with sex workers. The case story approach proved ideal for working with information like this that is highly sensitive and vulnerable to breach of anonymity because the method limits the potential to betray confidences and sources, and limits the potential to jeopardize funding and thereby jeopardize programming. This method enabled us to use specific examples without jeopardizing the organizations and individuals involved while demonstrating unintended consequences of PEPFAR's anti-prostitution pledge in its provision of services to sex workers and clients. ; Melissa Hope Ditmore was supported as a postdoctoral fellow in the Behavioral Sciences Training in Drug Abuse Research program sponsored by Public Health Solutions and the National Development and Research Institutes (NDRI) with funding from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (5T32 DA07233). The HIV Social Behavioural and Epidemiological Studies Unit was funded by the Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto. The CIHR Social Research Centre in HIV Prevention (SRC) was funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.
IntroductionSince 2003, US government funding to address the HIV and AIDS pandemic has been subject to an anti‐prostitution clause. Simultaneously, the efficacy of some HIV prevention efforts for sex work in areas receiving US government funding has diminished. This article seeks to explain why.MethodsThis analysis utilizes a case story approach to build a narrative of defining features of organizations in receipt of funding from the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and other US funding sources. For this analysis, multiple cases were compiled within a single narrative. This helps show restrictions imposed by the anti‐prostitution clause, any lack of clarity of guidelines for implementation and ways some agencies, decision‐making personnel, and staff on the ground contend with these restrictions.ResultsResponses to PEPFAR's anti‐prostitution clause vary widely and have varied over time. Organizational responses have included ending services for sex workers, gradual phase‐out of services, cessation of seeking US government HIV funds and increasing isolation of sex workers. Guidance issued in 2010 did not clarify what was permitted. Implementation and enforcement has been dependent in part on the interpretations of this policy by individuals, including US government representatives and organizational staff.ConclusionsDifferent interpretations of the anti‐prostitution clause have led to variations in programming, affecting the effectiveness of work with sex workers. The case story approach proved ideal for working with information like this that is highly sensitive and vulnerable to breach of anonymity because the method limits the potential to betray confidences and sources, and limits the potential to jeopardize funding and thereby jeopardize programming. This method enabled us to use specific examples without jeopardizing the organizations and individuals involved while demonstrating unintended consequences of PEPFAR's anti‐prostitution pledge in its provision of services to sex workers and clients.
This is a book chapter published by UCT Press, available online: https://www.idrc.ca/sites/default/files/openebooks/588-5/index.html ; This chapter presents our experiences with capacity building developed across the course of a project to address vulnerable populations at risk for HIV and sexually transmitted infections (STis) in Shanghai, China, otherwise known as the Canada-China Project. We describe this approach to capacity building as action oriented as it is grounded in hands-on, active and pragmatic skills building and real-time work experience rather than being passive, theoretical and academic. In this chapter, we argue that the capacity-building efforts of the Canada-China Project were successful in particular, and in great part, because of a national innovation-oriented policy environment known as China's National Innovation Capacity. This orientation to innovation created a context suitable for the project's action-oriented capacity building. While many of the mechanisms through which project activities operated may have met with resistance or discomfort given China's unique historical and political context, the widespread institutional and philosophical orientation towards innovation mitigated such resistance and created a fertile socio-political and policy context within which capacity building could unfold. This chapter reflects on the research capacity-building work of the Canada-China Project in light of these contextual considerations and the project's achievements, outcomes and novelty as well as lessons learned with regard to advancing our own understanding of capacity building. ; Funding provided by the Teasdale-Corti Global Health Research Partnership Program (IDRC, CIDA, CIHR and Health Canada), Grant#103460-045.
Abstract Party-n-Play (PNP) refers to sex between gay and bisexual men that occurs under the influence of drugs. Growing evidence suggests gay and bisexual men who PNP experience significant stigma and social exclusion. Less is known about the resilience of this population. Utilising critical discourse analysis, this study examined how gay and bisexual men who PNP talk about social exclusion and resilience in their lives. In-depth one-hour interviews were conducted with forty-four gay and bisexual men who lived in Toronto, and who used various drugs before or during sex with another man in the previous month. Study findings revealed that social exclusion was perpetuated through discourses of stigma, deviance, morality, heteronormativity, homophobia, racism, classism, risk and policing. These discourses also negatively affected participants' interactions with health care providers. However, many participants evoked resilience discourses and described social bonds, friendships and relations of care in their networks. Social work professionals would benefit from examining the roles of social exclusion, as well as stigmatising and pathologising discourses in their practice. These findings also underscore the need for culturally sensitive social work interventions for this population that address social exclusion and foster resilience.
