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45 Contemp. Drug Probs. 3 (2018)

handle is hein.journals/condp45 and id is 1 raw text is: 





Contemporary Issues
                                                                          Contemporary Drug Problems
                                                                                2018, Vol. 45(1) 3-14
                                                                                @ The Author(s) 2017
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andDO: 10.1177/0091450917748760
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a   Poststructural Analytic Strategy                                                 OSAGE




Carol   Bacchi'



Abstract
This article puts in question the usefulness of the concept of problem or problems in alcohol and
drug research and  theory. A focus on problematizations is defended as a more effective political
intervention. Particular attention is directed to the place of problematization as a mediating concept in
understanding how  practices constitute objects and subjects, a proposition commonly linked to
the ontological turn. To access and analyze problematizations, the article puts forward a Foucault-
influenced poststructural analytic strategy called What's the Problem Represented to be? (WPR
approach). Previously applied to the policy field, this article illustrates the usefulness of the WPR
approach to interrogate the full range of governmental and knowledge practices. Examples of appli-
cation of WPR  from the alcohol and other drug field are highlighted throughout. The article extends
this work by directing particular attention to the forms of politics facilitated through such an analytic
strategy and to the importance of applying this form of questioning to one's own propositions and
policy proposals.


Keywords
problem, problematizations, WPR, ontological turn, practices, objectivizations



This article focuses on the desirability of replacing problems with problematizations in alcohol and other
drug research and related social theory. It begins by elaborating concerns with the ways in which the
concepts problem and problems operate in the alcohol and other drug field historically and currently. It
then proceeds to explain how the study of problematizations produces insights into modes of governing
and the enactment of subjects and objects. A poststructural analytic strategy, the What's the
Problem  Represented to be? (WPR approach), is offered as a means to undertake this form of study
(Bacchi, 1999, 2009; Bacchi & Goodwin,  2016). Several researchers have already applied the WPR


Department of Politics and International Studies, Faculty of Arts, School of Social Sciences, University of Adelaide, Adelaide,
South Australia, Australia
Received November 6, 2017. Accepted for publication November 28, 2017.
Corresponding Author:
Carol Bacchi, Department of Politics and International Studies, Faculty of Arts, School of Social Sciences, University of Adelaide,
Adelaide, South Australia 5005, Australia.
Email: carol.bacchi@adelaide.edu.au

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