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Health risks, social relations and class: an analysis of occupational health discourse in Finnish newspaper and women's magazine articles 1961–2008
Author(s) -
Varje Pekka,
Väänänen Ari
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
sociology of health and illness
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.146
H-Index - 97
eISSN - 1467-9566
pISSN - 0141-9889
DOI - 10.1111/1467-9566.12376
Subject(s) - newspaper , ideology , social class , sociology , psychosocial , social inequality , public health , discourse analysis , critical discourse analysis , inequality , occupational safety and health , gender studies , middle class , political science , politics , media studies , psychology , medicine , mathematical analysis , linguistics , philosophy , mathematics , nursing , psychiatry , law
In this article we examine the treatment of psychosocial risks in public occupational health discourse in Finnish newspaper and magazine articles between the 1960s and 2000s, using discourse analysis. Building on class theories, our aim is to investigate how class expectations have been linked with the redefinition of occupational health risks during this period. Our results suggest that as social relations at the workplace became problematised in the occupational health discussions after the 1970s, the image of the hierarchical and naturally conflictual organisation was replaced by idealised middle‐class notions of smoothly functioning, harmonious organisations that offered rewarding work experiences. However, this same period since the late 1970s has also been characterised by increasing economic competition and neoliberal market ideology. We conclude that the concern about work‐related psychosocial risks and health problems expressed in Finnish newspaper and magazine articles during the last three decades has been shaped in many respects by a collision between the dominant middle‐class expectations of harmony and equality and the neoliberal production of competition and inequality.