RISULTATI RICERCA

Contemporary Images of Consumption: How Advertising Defuses Radical Critique This paper examines how the contemporary capitalist system through advertising commodities absorbs new forms of critique into its mechanisms of reproduction. In particular it examines a series of colour advertisements published in English national newspapers during the spring of 2008 which incorporate ‘green’ themes within their marketing rhetoric. The method used involved a detailed analysis of prominent advertisements for a range of products: cars, trainers, electrical appliances and chemicals. The interpretative approach utilized combined two strands of hermeneutical inquiry. The first involved an examination of the detailed phenomenal field properties of the advertisements themselves. The second involved the application of discourse analysis to the images within the context of the ‘new economic sociology’.

Csr’s ethical-semantic dimension. A research about employees social expectations of business Standing out from usual discussions concerned with best practices of corporate social responsibility or fairness in a multi-stakeholder model, this paper is going to achieve another point of view. It is intended to explore the so-called Csr’s ethical-semantic dimension. This formulation denotes productions of sense that cover social expectations of business action. Here the subject to be inquired is employees as a stakeholder, i.e. holder of values, desires and demands on corporate life. So, what I try to understand about it is the possible correlation between occupational classes and different schemes of expectations; moreover, the possible circulation of a common sense on Csr among different occupational classes.

Meaning changes in tourism and new connections between territory and enterpriseResearch on tourists’ motivations and attitudes in Riviera Romagnola put into evidence that individuals are no more influenced from particular senses of belonging to a class or a cetus; they tend to follow more ephemeral orientations and belongings, which are connected to some elective groups. Today, tourist choice is more articulated and less predictable than before. This trend implies a new challenge for tourist entrepreneurs; most of them began to work in a mass tourism context, and now they feel alone, without any orientation model. In this contribution, we want to show some results of a research we did about local tourist entrepreneurs, in order to focus on how they perceive such change, and how they are planning some strategies to accomplish the new demand trends; at the same time, the research considers how entrepreneurs’ strategies are keeping or developing a corporate social responsibility for the local community.

Consumer Social Responsibility and Corporate Social Responsibility To what extent can consumers support a firm’s decision to make socially responsible choices? After presenting the main examples of ethical consumerism, this article proposes a definition of Consumer Social Responsibility and focuses on the experience of the Gruppi di Acquisto Solidale; this seems to be the case study most closely connected to the idea of Consumer Social Responsibility with a view to actively promoting Corporate Social Responsibility.

Gift or robbery? Oikos and ethos between sense and social relationship The reflection concerns the social responsibility in the relationship between subjects and firms, taking a view from the social and cultural importance of the gift. The socio-cultural landscape of the gift is interesting as it regards a new sense making on the vocation and the internal orientation about quality and values, report, over the simple exchange. Nowadays it’s time to reasoning on the gift as engine of the civil, social and cultural responsibility in and out the business community. The sociology of gift represents a possible answer to real needs in everyday life and in the social market: a new opportunity or the new challenge for the tutorship of the social bond towards everyone’s dignity, liberty and responsibility.

Profit and Non-profit companies facing environmental issue Companies’ action has be usually seen as antagonist to the environment. Environmental organisations have fought for a long period against entrepreneurs threatening the ecosystems. The paper seeks to understand at analytical level the reasons of such contraposition. A better understanding of that can help to reduce the environmental problem and to evaluate the many policy instruments elaborated for regulating the economic activities. Three approaches can summarise the research field: the company attempts to reduce uncertainty, the regulations of firm negative side effects and the company ‘altruistic’ identity as source of voluntary commitment to environmental issue.

Consumption and ethics in a sociological perspective, for a theory of responsible consumptionCorporate social responsibility and ethical behaviours of consumers are two aspects of the same process which is here defined like a progressive moralization of the market. This allows to talk about a culture of responsibility in which we can replace the relations between State, market and civil society and it takes us to think over a wider meaning of responsible citizenship.

Corporate social responsibility and performance: is Csr economically sustainable? Corporate social responsibility (Csr) involves a shift of paradigm from the traditional approach of maximizing the shareholder’s value to a more complex multistakeholder approach. The economic sustainability of Csr crucially depends on the nexus between Csr and corporate performance. In this respect, standard Csr definitions document that this change of focus entails additional costs for the firm in exchange of some potential benefits. We shed light on such benefits emphazising: i) the potential positive productivity effect due to standard efficiency wage arguments and more original intrinsic motivation rationales; ii) the consumer demand effect depending on the willingness to pay of socially responsible consumers; iii) the effect of reduced transaction costs due to the minimization of conflicts with stakeholders.

Corporate social responsibility: the basics for being an entrepreneur and managing an enterprise Enterprises are not only combination of contractual relations but they are communities where there are members with specific culture and sensibility. At present the market also values enterprises with reference to their social performances. In fact there are a lot of stakeholders that are interested in moral behaviours of the enterprises. According to traditional opinion, enterprises that adopt a social policy have higher costs. This article aims at changing this approach. In fact reputation is a fundamental intangible asset that improves enterprises’ value. Loyalty and confidence reduce control and negotiation costs. Besides cooperation between enterprises and society generate good externalities for all the system.

Market: fact or values? Beyond dichotomy! Economists are fond of proposing market solutions for many problems of resource allocation, while scholars from other social disciplines are often less inclined to adopt such solutions. In this essay I interpret the dichotomy for/against the market in the light of the one between neoclassical economics and the socio-anthropological tradition which originates with Karl Polanyi. In the first part, I suggest that this dichotomy runs in parallel to the one between facts and, which is typical of (neo)positivist thought. This dichotomy, which has been analyzed by Hilary Putnam, also reflects the self-portrait of neoclassical economics, as it has been proposed by Pareto and Robbins. Following this perspective in the second part I suggest on the one hand that the work of Polanyi should be interpreted as a reaction to neoclassical economics, but on the other hand it is also based on an incorrect interpretation of both facts and ideas in the history of ancient societies. Finally I notice that, although recent researches confirm that ancient societies should be interpreted as conglomerations of interdependent markets (thus following Temin against Polanyi and Finley), the presence and relevance of markets does not justify an under-socialized interpretation of ancient market economies: on the contrary, as it was well clear to many scholars, in a tradition that loosely connects Homer with Adam Smith, markets are and should be interpreted as value-laden facts. In the conclusion I discuss some implications of this view for the analysis of contemporary society.

Ethics and corporations: an introductory comment This introductory work aims to give a concise outline of the worrying consequences of some corporations’ activities in the capitalistic world economy of today. We’ll start sketching the different shapes of capitalism and the corporations’ role, as well as we’ll briefly mention the scandals and the deep crisis that have recently marked them. Afterwards, we’ll debate the most relevant changes occurred in management in the light of the growing demand of ethic responsibility by the world public opinion, also showing the harmful effects of the wide de-localizing politics both on a social and environmental level. Finally, we’ll consider the corporations development in front of consumer citizens’ demand along with the hard changes the tycoons of modern economy have to carry out in order to deal with global competition and social responsibility as well.

The presence of the family Thirty years of family therapy in public services In Italy, family therapy developed strong connections with institutions, mainly with mental health Services. After the passing of the Law 180 (psychiatric reform), in 1978, family therapy was implemented with growing frequency within the National Health Service. This development contributed to the characterization of family therapy in the European panorama, on the one hand, and to the growth of different approaches, on the other. The various approaches contain such features as: creativity, multidisciplinarity and community based orientation. They express thirty years of dialogue between schools of family therapy and psychiatric Services. Keywords: family therapy, psychiatric services, schizophrenia, psychoeducation.

The presence of the family Thirty years of family therapy in public services In Italy, family therapy developed strong connections with institutions, mainly with mental health Services. After the passing of the Law 180 (psychiatric reform), in 1978, family therapy was implemented with growing frequency within the National Health Service. This development contributed to the characterization of family therapy in the European panorama, on the one hand, and to the growth of different approaches, on the other. The various approaches contain such features as: creativity, multidisciplinarity and community based orientation. They express thirty years of dialogue between schools of family therapy and psychiatric Services. Keywords: family therapy, psychiatric services, schizophrenia, psychoeducation.

Marital separations and new families: educational questions The significant increase in marital separations and the new ties between parents and children that form and evolve during the different steps of the marital separation (as for instance in monoparental families and stepfamilies) - challenge current educational ideas. The author first presents statistical and socio-anthropological data, then proposes a pedagogical study, using an existential-phenomenological point of view, to provide a meaningful horizon to today’s questions in education. The author analyses, in particular, the complex link between continuity and change, during the transition from one family condition to the next, and the possibility of building an educational project that, beyond the choice of separating, opens the prospect of maintaining co-parenting. Particular attention is given to caring and emotional life. Keywords: projects, opportunities, existence, temporality, care, emotional life, educational responsibilities.

Parents and educational services Preschools (infant-toddler centres and preschools) increasingly support families in child care. They offer settings for child education, venues for training teachers and parents, and put forward opportunities for social and cultural promotion in civil society. They build an environment for the study of educational relationships, interconnecting different educational projects. The public preschools in Reggio Emilia do not consider themselves the sole holders of educational knowledge an approach that stems from their experience - and thus promote dialogue with, and among, parents, considered persons with experience and knowledge, and hence active contributors to the understanding of children. Consequently, the schools as institutions, value parents’ educational experience, and offer friendly settings for dialogue and cooperation. They create a milieu that shores up confidence and understanding among teachers, parents and children, and facilitates the combined research for educational meanings, and a debate between different points of view. Such exchanges of opinions - on how to look at, or understand, children’s culture and rights - unquestionably represent the surfacing in civil society of more complex social representations of children and human beings, and illustrates the growth of a social capital produced by parents, individuals or citizen. Keywords: Reggio Emilia, educational services, parents, families, citizenship, participation

Development and homoparentality: a review of studies comparing homosexual and heterosexual families the paper presents a review of a growing body of studies on homosexual parents and their children. The review presents the differences - concerning the adjustment of the children (mental health and cognitive development) in psychosexual development, relationships with peers, and parental skills. The studies on the children of homosexual families, published between 1978 and 2007, were identified through two databases, Medline and PsycInfo. Only the studies with control groups were retained. The authors found 26 studies, described in 33 publications. The review of these articles brings to light that children brought up by homosexual parents do not differ from other children in adjustment and psychosexual development. However, 2 out of the 8 studies, investigating peer relations, described episodes of stigma endured by the children of homosexual families. Furthermore, the quality of parenting, comparing homosexual and heterosexual parents, does not differ much. Though, findings do suggest that homosexual parents tend to reveal better parenting skills. Parents’ sexual orientation, at least as regards lesbian mothers, does not seem to hinder the children’s development. On the other hand, stigma and the lack of social and legal recognition does impinge on homosexual families. Keywords: children, lesbians, gay men, parenting, psychological outcomes, review.

Family secrets. HIV positive children and adolescents. A psychoanalytically-oriented approach This paper illustrates a psychoanalytically oriented study on HIV positive children and adolescents, carried out by a team of clinical psychologists and psychotherapists of the Paediatric Department of the University Federico II in Naples. The authors first describe the collaboration between the departments of Paediatrics and Psychology and then examine three case studies of children - on the threshold of adolescence, expressing different degrees of awareness of their disease or of their personal family history. HIV patients have to face the communication of the diagnosis of their chronic and life-threatening disease, but they also have to deal with other specific problems such as: the loss of one or both their parents and the problematic social circumstances that brought about their parents’ sickness (drug-addiction, sexual promiscuity). The teams tend, as a result, to delay the communication of the diagnosis, that remains undisclosed. The team’s work - that comprises a variety of psychological services - aims at putting together the conditions that allow a gradual and cautious communication of the diagnosis while supporting the children, adolescents, parents and/or caregivers, physicians and nurses in this complex process. Keywords: HIV, diagnosis, communication, psychoanalytic psychotherapy, adolescents, caregivers.