Eurograd message

                Dear Colleagues,
<br>
<br>
<br>As part of the Wellcome funded Liminal Spaces project, Agomoni Ganguli Mitra
<br>and I are organising a workshop on social norms and health in Edinburgh 6-7
<br>September 2018. We are now putting out a call for abstracts from early career
<br>researchers who are working on topics related to health and social norms.
<br>
<br>This is an exciting opportunity for ECRS from a range of disciplines
<br>(including but not limited to bioethics, law, public health, sociology and
<br>STS) and we would be grateful if you could circulate it widely amongst all
<br>relevant research networks.
<br>
<br>Please do not hesitate to get in touch if your require further information,
<br>Regards,
<br>
<br>
<br>Ago and Isabel
<br>
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<br>
<br>We invite abstracts from early career researchers for 15 minute presentations
<br>at our Social norms and health: critique, evaluation and justification
<br>workshop, to be held in Edinburgh September 6th and 7th 2018.
<br>
<br>A key aim of this event is to create interdisciplinary dialogue to develop new
<br>ways of working with social norms, and so we request that all participants
<br>attend both days. Funding is available to cover the cost of accommodation and
<br>travel (within the UK) for those ECRs whose abstracts are accepted.
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>The submission deadline is July 27th 2018. Prospective participants are kindly
<br>requested to submit an abstract of max. 250 words to the following email
<br>address: I.Fletcher@ed.ac.uk.
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>Social norms and health: critique, evaluation and justification
<br>
<br>Overview
<br>
<br>Social norms act as extra-legal mechanisms or social conventions that steer
<br>and reinforce attitudes and choices in a variety of social spheresincluding
<br>healthacting against, or in tandem with law, regulation and policy. Engaging
<br>with norms and understanding their operation is vital, given the urgency of
<br>health problems that are driven by human practices, and because health
<br>policies, both in the domestic and international arena, are themselves often
<br>aimed at changing norms and behaviour. While there has been considerable work
<br>on this area within social science, continued interdisciplinary dialogue is
<br>required develop constructive and justified approaches to critiquing and
<br>changing social norms. We contend that in order to adequately address a number
<br>of challenges in global health and wellbeing, it is necessary to develop
<br>sophisticated and normatively sound mechanisms to evaluate and govern social
<br>norms in health policy, practice and activism.
<br>
<br>Existing mechanisms for behaviour modification  including incentives, nudges,
<br>and technological fixes - often lack both normative rigour and moral
<br>legitimacy. They might also further reinforce problematic norms, or eschew
<br>ethics in favour of efficiency, for example by reinforcing gender
<br>discrimination or further stigmatising overweight individuals. Just as
<br>problematically, such approaches often shift the burden onto individuals for
<br>what should either be collective change - in socially condoned gender
<br>discrimination, for example - or that should be driven via long-term policy
<br>change in sectors beyond health, such as shifting agricultural subsidies to
<br>improve access to healthy food.
<br>
<br>If we are to address norms with the goal of improving global health, we need
<br>to develop a shared account of norms and their operation, one that can align
<br>both efficacy and moral legitimacy. Our hypothesis is that this can be done by
<br>appealing to considerations of justice, by focussing on collectives over
<br>individuals, and by shifting a larger part of the moral burden onto groups,
<br>institutions, practices and policies. We suggest that further exploring norms
<br>can help us understand how certain behaviours and attitudes are reinforced or
<br>altered. In doing so, we are pulling away from the idea of the ideal,
<br>rational, homo economicus that many policies and guidelines tend to address,
<br>and further exploring how socially embedded individuals choose and act within
<br>their particular contexts.
<br>
<br>
<br>Draft Programme
<br>
<br>Day One
<br>
<br>Arrival and welcome
<br>Session One: Concepts and mechanisms
<br>Lunchtime
<br>Session Two: Norms and Health
<br>Coffee break
<br>Session Three: Norms and Diet
<br>Conference Dinner
<br>
<br>Day Two
<br>
<br>Session Four: Norms and Gender
<br>Session Five: Norms, behaviour change and inequality: new approaches
<br>Coffee break
<br>Session Six: Final Roundtable and Future Steps
<br>Lunch
<br>
<br>
<br>Isabel Fletcher PhD
<br>Senior Research Fellow (Medical Sociology)
<br>Liminal Spaces Project
<br>The Mason Institute
<br>Edinburgh Law School
<br>Old College
<br>South Bridge
<br>Edinburgh EH8 9YL
<br>
<br>Email: I.Fletcher@ed.ac.uk
<br>Tel: 0131 651 4792
<br>
<br>[demime 1.01d removed an attachment of type application/pdf which had a name of Norms_ECR call_28.6.pdf]
<br>The University of Edinburgh is a charitable body, registered in
<br>Scotland, with registration number SC005336.
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