>Resent-date: Thu, 23 Sep 1999 06:40:51 -0005 >Date: Thu, 23 Sep 1999 03:36:53 -0700 >Resent-from: [log in to unmask] >From: Ron Roizen <[log in to unmask]> >Subject: Ramblings on reading Blomqvist (1998) >Sender: Kettil Bruun Society <[log in to unmask]> >Approved-by: Ron Roizen <[log in to unmask]> >Resent-to: [log in to unmask] >To: [log in to unmask] >Reply-to: [log in to unmask] >MIME-version: 1.0 >X-Priority: 3 >X-MSMail-priority: Normal >Comments: cc: Jan Blomqvist <[log in to unmask]> >Original-recipient: rfc822;[log in to unmask] > >I have a special affinity for Jan Blomqvist's recent and excellent paper, >"The 'Swedish model' of dealing with alcohol problems: historical trends >and future challenges" (Contemporary Drug Problems 25:253-320, 1998) >because Jan tackles in it the same problem I've tied to tackle in the U.S. >context -- namely, how do we get a conceptual handle on the changing >conceptualization, social management, and institutional structuring of the >(so-called) alcohol problem over historical time? I see Jan's paper, >therefore, as offering something of a parallel to, for example, in my "How >Does the Nation's 'Alcohol Problem' Change From Era to Era? Stalking the >Social Logic of Problem-Definition Transformations Since Repeal" >(http://www.roizen.com/ron/postrepeal.htme)--though, and to be fair, Jan's >paper is a more theoretically ambitious enterprise. > >I read Jan's paper, therefore, with two comparative questions or planes in >mind: (1) How does the Swedish history he describes compare and contrast >with the U.S. history? and (2) How well does the theoretical framework Jan >offers work --both as a logical framework, per se, and as it may apply to >U.S. transformations? There were, to be sure, many points of similarity >between the Swedish and U.S. historical stories -- especially as his >account approached closer and closer to the present. Here in the U.S., for >example, we've also seen an increasingly money-minded sensibility toward >alcohol treatment with the rise of managed care, the legacy of the >recession of the early 1990s, and a return of the "moral model" to the >national debate over substance abuse. Jan's account of the 1980s in Sweden >also had close resonances with contemporaneous U.S. changes--as for example >are recounted in Schmidt and Wiesner's (1993) excellent summary of the >decade ("Developments in Alcoholism Treatment: A Ten Year Review," pp. >369-396 in Marc Galanter (ed.), Recent Developments in Alcoholism, vol. 11, >New York: Plenum, 1993). Such echoes across national settings beg for (a) >explanation that involves a trans-national set of explanatory factors or >(b) an internal historical logic that in effect generates the same >transformations at roughly the same historical moments or (c) a bit of >both. Such echoes also call for close attention to how national situations >actually vary in the details and nuances--a focus made possible by Jan's >paper's rich supply of nuanced detail. It makes me want to assemble a very >fine-grained chart organized by decade, by similarities, and by differences >in the Swedish/U.S. unfolding alcohol-social-management story. > >But yesterday I was sitting in my car in the parking lot in Coeur d'Alene, >waiting for my wife who had gone in for a clinic appointment, and a >different set of thoughts came over me re Jan's paper. I started asking >myself: Where are we ever going to find general theory for Jan's problem. >This prompted a feeling of (let's call it) measured hopelessness about the >prospects. After all, the more nuanced the explanatory situation, the more >dimensions are potentially brought into explanatory play. I was reminded, >sitting there, of the excitement of, as an undergrad sociology student in >the Sixties, reading for the first time Fuller and Meyers (1941) paper >arguing that social problems had discernable "natural histories"--taking >them through predictable stages of development ("The natural history of a >social problem," _Am. Sociol. Rev._ 6:320-329). And I wondered about their >simple and yet remarkable insight as it applied to "the alcohol problem." >What might be the "end stage" of the alcohol problem--do societies rattle >around with this or that tension surrounding alcohol until they at last end >up with either the normalization of wine-drinking cultures or the >abstinence of strictly Muslim states? Or was "natural history" an idea >that just didn't apply l to alcohol--because of "the problem's" enduring >presence in one form or another? > >Beyond "natural history" theory is cyclical theory--which we have available >in for example Blocker's (1989) loosely structured account of U.S. alcohol >history as well as in Bruun-ian notion that change in this social arena >consists of a Mad Hatter-like tea-party table with place settings for >different institutional rubrics all around -- and "history" thus comprises >a (senseless?) tea-party progression from one setting to the next as the >utility and patience of each institutional rubric is exhausted or shown to >be lacking. This was the spirit, I think, of Robin Room's use of the term >"intractable" in his dissertation's title: namely, the "alcohol problem" >is always out there -- like a stubborn ghost -- and human society simply >shifts its social definition from institutional assumptions to >institutional assumptions around Bruun's tea-party table. > >And yet reading Jan's paper also suggests the metaphor of some kind of >on-going, alcohol-arena grand opera -- with new ACTS (outfitted with new >characters, new melodies, and new sets) always somehow coming forward to >fill the future's stage. The opera is unending -- and our task becomes >that of (a) opera critic (i.e., evaluating the merits and demerits of the >latest act) and (b) cultural seer (i.e., trying to decipher--as Jan does at >the close of his paper--where the hidden cultural-political Mozart may be >taking the opera next). Or is a hidden Mozart not the place to focus the >attention at all, but rather the changing kaleidoscope of the cast of >characters that animate and struggle to find useful alliances and new >patches of common ground in the unfolding story? Focussing on the changing >cast of players has led me before to explore Paul Sabatier's "advocacy >coalition framework" as it sheds light on changes in the alcohol problems >social arena (see, e.g., "An advocacy coalition framework of policy change >and the role of policy-oriented learning therein," _Policy Sciences_ >21:129-168, 1988 and "Toward better theories of the policy process," >_Political Science & Politics_ 24:147-156, 1991). Resource Mobilization >Theory also represents, I believe, a potentially useful but largely >untapped realm of potential theoretical structuring for the "change >problem" (e.g., Morris, A.D. & Mueller, C.M. (eds), _Frontiers in Social >Movement Theory_, 1992). > >All this (useless?) rumination sprang, I suppose, from the sense of rich >complexity that Jan's paper offers. This symbolic arena is crowded with >social handling possibilities and their moral-conceptual coordinates. Even >in one perspective's heyday the other perspectives are still there, are >still structuring some aspect of the situation, and stand ready to exert >more influence if the contextual circumstances change in a direction >favorable to them. And so we have overlapping, layered, and >interpenetrating "frameworks" to try to comprehend -- in a complexity even >more greatly elaborated perhaps in Valverde's (1998) recent book. And like >Valverde, we might be wise to put trying to understand "the alcohol >problem's" transformations on hold for a time and focus instead on how that >"problem" offers a lens for inventorying and structuring the staggering >complexity and multi-faceted character of social control, per se. > >But some hints of theoretical possibility shine through too in Jan's paper. > Seeing the old jockeying with the new (and on surprisingly equal terms) in >Jan's paper makes me more convinced than ever that a general >historical-structural theory of this domain will incorporate the strain >between modernization and traditionalism -- and "the alcohol arena's" >peculiar quality as a symbolic outpost of traditionalist cultural capital >(coming and going!). We also see in Jan's account the prospect of using >alcohol as a medium for viewing border disputes and warfare across the >major institutional domains and baronies of modern society. And finally, >and of course, there is the merit to a continuing exploration and >discussion of Jan's own four-fold moral-conceptual model of the property >space that this theater of historical change occupies. > >I think it was T.H. Huxley who paid Darwin's _Origin of Species_ the >compliment that "He'd liked it so much he'd wished he'd authored it >himself!" I had the same feeling reading Jan's paper! > >Ron > > ----- >To join the KBS-LIST, send the command > SUBSCRIBE KBS-LIST YOURFIRSTNAME YOURLASTNAME >To signoff the list, send the command > SIGNOFF KBS-LIST to [log in to unmask] >If you experience difficulties signing on or off, write to >[log in to unmask] >