The Welfare Police: The Affective Politics of 'Proximity' in the Danish Welfare State.
This article investigates the role of Danish police not as enforcers of sovereign order, but as ambassadors of the welfare state—more specifically an image of the welfare state as a benign, caring, and 'intimate' kind of polity. Focusing on a recent police reform, the article shows how the emic Scan...
| Published in: | Social Analysis Vol. 69; no. 1; pp. 25 - 46 |
|---|---|
| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Article |
| Published: |
Berghahn Books
2025
|
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | View this record in EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ssf&AN=188102412&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: ssf uiTerm: 188102412 longDbName: Social Sciences Full Text (H.W. Wilson) uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 0155977X H9B jtl: Social Analysis issn: 0155977X maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: 2025 vid: 69 iid: 1 pid: 1130 pub: Berghahn Books artinfo: ui: 188102412 10.3167/sa.2025.690102 ppf: 25 ppct: 21 formats: fmt: – @attributes: type: T – @attributes: type: P size: 958KB tig: atl: The Welfare Police: The Affective Politics of 'Proximity' in the Danish Welfare State. aug: au: Elbek, Laust Lund affil: Assistant Professor, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark su: Welfare state Sovereignty Police Small cities Social democracy sug: subj: Welfare state Sovereignty Police Small cities Social democracy Municipal police services Provincial police services Federal police services Police Protection keyword: intimacy nostalgia politics Scandinavia spectacle intimacy nostalgia politics Scandinavia spectacle ab: This article investigates the role of Danish police not as enforcers of sovereign order, but as ambassadors of the welfare state—more specifically an image of the welfare state as a benign, caring, and 'intimate' kind of polity. Focusing on a recent police reform, the article shows how the emic Scandinavian concept of nærhed (proximity) works as the ideational basis for the 'welfarization' of the police by mobilizing a nostalgic image of small-town sociality as a symbolic reservoir for the welfare state writ large. This political project—while drawing from deeply embedded imaginaries of what constitutes a 'good state'—also points to ongoing negotiations of the boundaries of the Danish welfare state as an affective community. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: N holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
|---|