Affective citizenship: on the role of emotions in

social, urban and environmental policy

Mandy De Wilde∗1 and Thomas Kampen∗1

1
University of Amsterdam (UvA) – Netherlands

Abstract

This session investigates the role of emotions in the present-day construction of citi-
zenship. The last two decades have witnessed a shift from government to governance: a
non-hierarchical mode of governing expecting citizens to participate in the formulation of
public issues and the implementation of social policies. We have seen this in the areas of
long term care (LTC), active labour market policy (ALMP), urban and neighbourhood re-
generation and environmental activism. Previous research has shown how policies aiming
for ‘responsible’, ‘engaged’ or ‘self-reliant’ citizens have undergone an ‘affective turn’; gov-
ernments and other institutions increasingly encourage and acknowledge intimate relations
and aim to shape citizens’ values and feelings in order to engage them in the public domain.
In general, this panel welcomes contributions that explore the construction and implications
of ‘affective citizenship’. How does policy aim to construct responsible citizens by appealing
to their private and collective emotions, their personal sensitivities or their intimate rela-
tionships? What constitutive effects does affective citizenship entail? More specific, taking
our cue from IPA’s practical turn, we welcome contributions that focus on the intersections
between these policies and the actual engagement of citizens. How does governing through
emotions meet practical impediments, cultural conventions or political sensitivities when
carried out in practice by policy practitioners? And what does this mean for the democratic
or empowering potential of including emotions in social, urban or environmental policy?

We prefer contributions on the following topics:

- Urban and neighbourhood regeneration

- Long term care

- Active labour market policy

- Environmental activism

Keywords: citizenship, emotions, environmental activism, urban and neighbourhood regeneration,

long term care, active labour market policy

∗
Speaker

sciencesconf.org:ipa2015:49948