Carol Bacchi

University of Adelaide, Politics, Emerita

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Carol Bacchi is Professor Emerita of Politics at the University of Adelaide. She researchers and writes in the fields of feminist political theory, policy theory, mobility studies and citizenship. She is best known for the development of an analytic strategy for policy analysis, called "What's the Problem Represented to be?" (the WPR approach). Bacchi has written a text introducing the approach (Analysing Policy: What's the Problem Represented to be?, Pearson Education, 2009). Examples of application of the approach are available in her most recent book, Poststructural Policy Analysis: A Guide to Practice (Palgrave Macmillan, 2016), co-authored with Susan Goodwin.
A new website provides links to important publications, replies to frequently asked questions about the WPR approach, and a research blog, where Bacchi comments on recent debates and books/articles in the field.
Go to: https://carolbacchi.com
Address: Politics Discipline
University of Adelaide

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Books by Carol Bacchi

Book: Poststructural Policy Analysis: A Guide to Practice Palgrave Macmillan 2016

by Carol Bacchi and Susan Goodwin

This book offers a novel, refreshing and politically engaged way to think about public policy. In... more This book offers a novel, refreshing and politically engaged way to think about public policy. Instead of treating policy as simply the government’s best efforts to address problems, it offers a way to question critically how policies produce “problems” as particular sorts of problems, with important political implications. Governing, it is argued, takes place through these problematizations. According to the authors, interrogating policies and policy proposals as problematizations involves asking questions about the assumptions they rely upon, how they have been made, what their effects are, as well as how they could be unmade. To enable this form of critical analysis, this book introduces an analytic strategy, the “What’s the Problem Represented to be?” (WPR) approach. It features examples of applications of the approach with topics as diverse as obesity, economic policy, migration, drug and alcohol policy, and gender equality to illustrate the growing popularity of this way of thinking and to provide clear and useful examples of poststructural policy analysis in practice.

Engaging with Carol Bacchi: Strategic Interventions and Exchanges. Edited by A. Bletsas and C. Beasley. University of Adelaide Press, 2012. Available as a free download.

Includes chapters on Bacchi's 'what's the problem represented to be?' approach to policy analysis... more

Analysing Policy: What's the problem represented to be? Pearson Education 2009

This book introduces a novel methodology for analysing policy. Through a series of 6 questions an... more This book introduces a novel methodology for analysing policy. Through a series of 6 questions and an undertaking to apply those questions to one's own proposals, it enables researchers to identify key presuppositions within policies and to consider the implications of those presuppositions. It also encourages researchers to reflect upon other possible ways of problematizing a range of important issues in the fields of health policy, criminal justice and immigration policy, education policy and citizenship (among others).

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Mainstreaming Politics: Gendering Practices and Feminist Theory. Co-authored with Joan Eveline. University of Adelaide Press, 2010. Available as a free download.

This book offers an innovative rethinking of policy approaches to 'gender equality' and of the pr... more This book offers an innovative rethinking of policy approaches to 'gender equality' and of the process of social change. It brings several new chapters together with a series of previously published articles to reflect on these topics. A particular focus is gender mainstreaming, a relatively recent development in equality policy in many industrialised and some industrialising countries, as well as in large organisations such as the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the International Labour Organization. The book draws upon poststructuralist organisation and policy theory to argue that it is impossible to 'script' reform initiatives such as gender mainstreaming. As an alternative it recommends thinking about such policy developments as fields of contestation, shaped by on-the-ground political deliberations and practices.

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Fear of Food: A diary of mothering. Spinifex Press, 2003.

Women, Policy and Politics: The construction of policy problems. Sage, 1999.

The Politics of Affirmative Action: 'Women', Equality and Category Politics. Sage, 1996.

A study of affirmative action policies in six countries: the United States, Canada, Australia, Sw... more A study of affirmative action policies in six countries: the United States, Canada, Australia, Sweden, Norway, The Netherlands - all countries put forward as leaders in introducing the reform. Bacchi compares the different ways in which the issue is problematised, detailing the effects in each country.

Left Directions: Is There a Third Way? Co-edited with Paul Nursey-Bray. University of WA Press, 2001.

Same Difference: Feminism and Sexual Difference. Allen & Unwin, 1990.

This book examines how the question of whether women are the same as or different from men gets s... more

Liberation Deferred? The Ideas of the English-Canadian Suffragists, 1877-1918. University of Toronto Press, 1983. Reprinted in 1986, 1987.

Papers by Carol Bacchi

Foucault, Policy and Rule: Challenging the Problem-Solving Paradigm

The purpose of this paper is to encourage a rethinking of the way in which 'problems' are commonl... more The purpose of this paper is to encourage a rethinking of the way in which 'problems' are commonly conceptualised in policy-making and policy analysis. More specifically, it highlights the emergence and strength of a problem-solving paradigm in a wide range of sites, a paradigm that assumes that 'problems' are readily identifiable and objective in nature, a paradigm it sets out to challenge. This paradigm is clearest in the turn to evidence-based policy in many western industrialized states, including the European Union, and in international organizations, such as the World Health Organization. As exemplars consider the European Commission Fifth Framework Programme (1998-2002) 'conceived', as the Overview description states, 'to help solve problems', and the online 'problem solving network' for EU Member States, called nothing less than 'SOLVIT'.

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An Ethic of Social Flesh: Moving Beyond Care and/or Trust

Australasian Political Studies Association Conference (2004: Adelaide, South Australia), 2004

Trust and Care are contemporary languages commonly used to address a perceived crisis in the main... more Trust and Care are contemporary languages commonly used to address a perceived crisis in the maintenance of community/interconnection and the political limits of competitive individualism. The crisis has been located at both the national and international levels. This paper traces some of the problems and possibilities associated with these languages. On trust, we look at Putnam, Fukuyama, Cox and Szreter, among others. In the case of care, we consider Gilligan, Levinas, Sevenhuijsen/Tronto and Hage. We conclude that the ...

Gender mainstreaming, affirmative action and diversity: Politics and meaning in gender equality policies

Bacchi, Carol.2010.Gender mainstreaming, affirmative action and diversity: Politics and meaning i... more

Gender mainstreaming or diversity mainstreaming? The politics of ‘doing’

University of Adelaide Press eBooks, Jun 22, 2012

FREIA's paper series contains working papers, papers for conferences and seminars, project descri... more FREIA's paper series contains working papers, papers for conferences and seminars, project descriptions, lecture manuscripts and book chapters. The papers are produced by researchers who are affiliated to FREIA or who have visited the centre. The paper series is intended to disseminate knowledge and increase awareness of FREIA's activities both internally and externally. Responsibility for the content of the published work remains with the respective author(s). The editor of the series is Associate Professor Christina Fiig.

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Personal reflection

University of Adelaide Press eBooks, Jun 22, 2012

Obeying organisational ‘rules of relevance’: Gender analysis of policy

University of Adelaide Press eBooks, Jun 22, 2012

Introduction: Joan Eveline and Carol Bacchi There is considerable research showing that organisat... more Introduction: Joan Eveline and Carol Bacchi There is considerable research showing that organisations, including government agencies and the policies they produce, consider gender irrelevant to their core business. The gender mainstreaming of policy is designed to challenge such an assumption, using the argument that mainstreaming gender can ‘transform’ the ubiquity of genderblind policies. Various countries, as this book (among others) shows, have developed particular methods and tool kits for transforming the outcomes of their policies, in order that those policies take seriously the relevance of gender. This chapter underscores the question of gender (ir)relevance, and how it is produced by complex organisational practices. It turns to feminist organisational theory to analyse the institutionalised practices that construct and organise policy priorities (see Chapter 6). In agreement with Benschop and Verloo (2006), we argue that effective gender mainstreaming cannot be achieved without attention to the specific organisational sites in which policy is developed and implemented. The chapter draws on the ‘turn to practice’ in organisational studies, and feminist strategies of ‘sudden seeing’, to consider what our insights from the gender analysis study might offer future interventionist projects. Western Australia furnishes most of the examples used in the chapter, although general descriptions of the project’s aims and challenges apply also to South Australia. The starting point for the chapter is our finding in Western Australia that it was only through doing the gender analysis in their organisational contexts that policy actors came to see the relevance of gender to policy.Joan Eveline and Carol Bacchihttp://www.adelaide.edu.au/press/titles/mainstreaming

Conclusion A politics of movement

University of Adelaide Press eBooks, Jun 22, 2012

Rights:© 2010 Carol Bacchi, Joan Eveline and the contributors. This book is copyright. Apart from... more Rights:© 2010 Carol Bacchi, Joan Eveline and the contributors. This book is copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of private study, research, criticism or review as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior written permission. Address all inquiries to the Director at the above address.

The Mageeq Project: Identifying Contesting Meanings of «Gender Equality»

Epitheōrīsī koinōnikōn ereunōn, Mar 9, 2016

In this article I engage with MAGEEQ methodology and theoretical assumptions to raise questions a... more In this article I engage with MAGEEQ methodology and theoretical assumptions to raise questions around the following themes: intentionality in political practice, meanings of discourse, and understandings of political subjectivity. I make the case that these topics need to be addressed in order to provide insights into the reasons social change is so difficult to achieve. Specifically, I suggest that feminists adopt a practice of «reflexive framing», examining how they represent social «problems», and broaden feminist constituencies through coalition to reduce the possibility of representing «problems» in ways that exclude or harm «others».

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Power, resistance and reflexive practice

University of Adelaide Press eBooks, Jun 22, 2012

Introduction: Joan Eveline and Carol Bacchi This chapter examines the primary organising processe... more Introduction: Joan Eveline and Carol Bacchi This chapter examines the primary organising processes which produce the meanings of policy statements. It outlines and inspects the social power circumscribing these policy statements, the relations of power and resistance involved in such statements, and their effects on those subject to the policy. The previous chapter outlined how the WPR approach concentrates on the constitutive effects of existing or proposed policies, showing how the characterising of policy ‘problems’ within those policies or proposals (what the ‘problem’ is represented to be) ‘shapes’ (or constitutes) people as particular kinds of subjects. This chapter pursues the point that policies elicit subjectivities, rather than determine them (Dean 1999: 32). It highlights the always-incomplete nature of subjectification processes, emphasising that the subjects of policy are always more than the products of policy regulation, whether explicit or implicit, as is the case in problem representations. In this view political subjects, both those who ‘do’ policy and those to whom it is ‘done’, are both subjected and resistant to policy discourses. A particular focus of this chapter and of the book is how ‘doing’ policy both produces and enables the subjectivities of those who analyse and develop it, including ourselves as researchers. The influences of feminist poststructuralism and recent organisational theory shape the propositions in this chapter. It was prompted by our wish as authors to fill a gap in our earlier and later chapters.Joan Eveline and Carol Bacch

Affirmative Action for Men: 'A Test of Common Sense'?

Just policy: a journal of Australian social policy, Jun 1, 2005

The politics of representations of affirmative action is highlighted. Australian Prime Minister J... more The politics of representations of affirmative action is highlighted. Australian Prime Minister John Howard justifies men's scholarships as common sense because they are gendering in their effects, sustaining a world in which men know what it means to be a man while he has been consistently in opposition to affirmative action for women and for Indigenous people in every setting.

Book: Poststructural Policy Analysis: A Guide to Practice Palgrave Macmillan 2016

by Carol Bacchi and Susan Goodwin

Engaging with Carol Bacchi: Strategic Interventions and Exchanges. Edited by A. Bletsas and C. Beasley. University of Adelaide Press, 2012. Available as a free download.

Includes chapters on Bacchi's 'what's the problem represented to be?' approach to policy analysis... more

Analysing Policy: What's the problem represented to be? Pearson Education 2009

Download

Mainstreaming Politics: Gendering Practices and Feminist Theory. Co-authored with Joan Eveline. University of Adelaide Press, 2010. Available as a free download.

Download

Fear of Food: A diary of mothering. Spinifex Press, 2003.

Women, Policy and Politics: The construction of policy problems. Sage, 1999.

The Politics of Affirmative Action: 'Women', Equality and Category Politics. Sage, 1996.

Left Directions: Is There a Third Way? Co-edited with Paul Nursey-Bray. University of WA Press, 2001.

Same Difference: Feminism and Sexual Difference. Allen & Unwin, 1990.

This book examines how the question of whether women are the same as or different from men gets s... more

Liberation Deferred? The Ideas of the English-Canadian Suffragists, 1877-1918. University of Toronto Press, 1983. Reprinted in 1986, 1987.

Foucault, Policy and Rule: Challenging the Problem-Solving Paradigm

Download

An Ethic of Social Flesh: Moving Beyond Care and/or Trust

Australasian Political Studies Association Conference (2004: Adelaide, South Australia), 2004

Gender mainstreaming, affirmative action and diversity: Politics and meaning in gender equality policies

Bacchi, Carol.2010.Gender mainstreaming, affirmative action and diversity: Politics and meaning i... more

Gender mainstreaming or diversity mainstreaming? The politics of ‘doing’

University of Adelaide Press eBooks, Jun 22, 2012

Download

Personal reflection

University of Adelaide Press eBooks, Jun 22, 2012

Obeying organisational ‘rules of relevance’: Gender analysis of policy

University of Adelaide Press eBooks, Jun 22, 2012

Conclusion A politics of movement

University of Adelaide Press eBooks, Jun 22, 2012

The Mageeq Project: Identifying Contesting Meanings of «Gender Equality»

Epitheōrīsī koinōnikōn ereunōn, Mar 9, 2016

Download

Power, resistance and reflexive practice

University of Adelaide Press eBooks, Jun 22, 2012

Affirmative Action for Men: 'A Test of Common Sense'?

Just policy: a journal of Australian social policy, Jun 1, 2005

University-public sector research collaboration: Mine the space, never mind the gap

Mainstreaming politics: Gendering practices and feminist theory

This chapter offers additional reflections on the &#x27;learnings&#x27; that emerged from... more This chapter offers additional reflections on the &#x27;learnings&#x27; that emerged from the Gender Analysis Project. With a particular focus on the South Australian experience, it outlines how the shared practice of collaborative discussion within the project&#x27;s reference group (which consisted of the university research team; representatives of the industry partner, Office for Women; and representatives of the three participating agencies) encouraged reflexivity among participants. Reflexivity here refers to an ability and willingness to examine one&#x27;s ...

Gender and cycling: Gendering cycling subjects and forming bikes, practices and spaces as gendered objects

Cycling Futures, 2015

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Approaches to gender mainstreaming: What's the problem represented to be?

Mainstreaming politics: Gendering practices and feminist theory

Previous chapters have made reference to the need to rethink policy as a creative (productive or ... more Previous chapters have made reference to the need to rethink policy as a creative (productive or constitutive) process. The major purpose of this chapter is to clarify what this means and to illustrate the usefulness of this way of thinking about policy for studying gender mainstreaming and gender analysis. The specific focus is &amp;amp;#x27;gender proofing&amp;amp;#x27;in Ireland and &amp;amp;#x27;gender impact assessment&amp;amp;#x27;in the Netherlands.

Gender mainstreaming and reflexivity: Asking some hard questions

keynote address at the Advancing Gender+ Training in …, 2011

FREIA Paper

Feminist Research Center in Aalborg Department of History, International and Social Studies Aalbo... more Feminist Research Center in Aalborg Department of History, International and Social Studies Aalborg University Fibigerstraede 2 DK-9220 Aalborg East Tel: + 45 9940 8310, Fax: + 459635 0044 Mail: [email protected], Web: http://freia.ihis.aau.dk/ ... Carol Bacchi Foucault, Policy and Rule: Challenging the Problem-Solving Paradigm ... Paper from FREIA – Feminist Research Center in Aalborg Department of History, International and Social Studies Aalborg University Fibigerstraede 2 9220 Aalborg East Tel.: +45 9940 8310 ... Download: http://freia.ihis.aau ...

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A Politics of Movement

Welcome to the electronic edition of Mainstreaming Poli-tics. The book opens with the bookmark panel and you will see the contents page. Click on this anytime to return to the contents. You can also add your own bookmarks., 2010

This collection of essays establishes the claim that it is unwise to think about 'gender mai... more This collection of essays establishes the claim that it is unwise to think about 'gender mainstreaming'or 'gender analysis' as sets of procedures that necessarily make useful changes when they are put into place as policies. Rather we direct attention to the on-the-ground political deliberations (at every level of social interaction) that affect what gets done and who gets to do it. It is the 'doings', the practices, that generate long-term learning and commitment, and that create the possibility that gender analysis can have some impact ...

10 Strategic interventions and ontological politics: Research as political practice

Welcome to the electronic edition of Engaging with Carol Bacchi. The book opens with the bookmark panel and you will see the contents page. Click on this anytime to return to the contents. You can also add your own bookmarks.

The focus of this chapter—research as political practice—highlights a long-standing concern in my... more The focus of this chapter—research as political practice—highlights a long-standing concern in my work with the connections between concepts and theories, and political investments. My particular interest is the ways these investments operate at non-conscious (note: not unconscious1) levels and how they shape or constitute us as particular kinds of political subjects. In my PhD thesis on the range of reasons for supporting women's enfranchisement, I explored the packages of proposals and norms that featured in the practices and textual ...

Power, resistance and reflexive practice1

The previous chapter outlined how the WPR approach concentrates on the constitutive effects of ex... more The previous chapter outlined how the WPR approach concentrates on the constitutive effects of existing or proposed policies, showing how the characterising of policy 'problems' within those policies or proposals (what the 'problem'is represented to be)'shapes'(or constitutes) people as particular kinds of subjects. This chapter pursues the point that policies elicit subjectivities, rather than determine them (Dean 1999: 32). It highlights the always-incomplete nature of subjectification processes, emphasising that the subjects of ...

Part 1 Studying Problematizations : Goals and Methods What Is Problematization ? What Are Problematizations ?

This paper introduces the theoretical concept, problematization, as it is developed in Foucauldia... more This paper introduces the theoretical concept, problematization, as it is developed in Foucauldian-inspired poststructural analysis. The objective is two-fold: first, to show how a study of problematizations politicizes taken-for-granted “truths”; and second, to illustrate how this analytic approach opens up novel ways of approaching the study of public policy, politics and comparative politics. The study of problematizations, it suggests, directs attention to the heterogenous strategic relations – the politics – that shape lives. It simultaneously alerts researchers to their unavoidable participation in these relations, opening up a much-needed conversation about the role of theory in politics.

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Analysing Policy: What’s the problem represented to be?

Contents: 1. Introducing a 'what's the problem represented to be?'approach to poli... more Contents: 1. Introducing a 'what's the problem represented to be?'approach to policy analysis--2. Rethinking policy analysis: Theory and politics--3. Welfare,'youth'and unemployment--4.'Dangerous' consumptions: Drugs/alcohol and gambling policy--5. Crime and justice--6. Health, wellbeing and the social determinants of health--7. Population, immigration, citizenship:'Securing'a place in the world--8. The limits of equality: Anti-discrimination and 'special measures'--9. The ambivalence of education: HECS and ...

Introducing the WPR approach. Click on link or copy to browser.. https://www.adelaide.edu.au/carst/online-modules/wpr/

The link above (or type the following into your browser - http://bit.ly/bacchi_wpr) connects to a... more The link above (or type the following into your browser - http://bit.ly/bacchi_wpr) connects to a series of video-recordings of lectures from an introductory course on the 'What's the Problem Represented to be?' approach to policy analysis. Additional readings and a glossary of key terms are also available.

Carol Bacchi website

This website (https://carolbacchi.com) targets those who are interested in Bacchi's "What's the P... more This website (https://carolbacchi.com) targets those who are interested in Bacchi's "What's the Problem Represented to be?" (WPR) approach to policy analysis, and those interested in contemporary debates in policy theory. There is a section on Resources, which includes videos of recent talks, a video workshop and helpful publications. A section on 'Frequently Asked Questions" and a "Research Hub" contains entries on new book and important theoretical debates. The contact page invites readers to submit comments and questions via Bacchi's email address, which is provided.

Deploying a poststructural analytic strategy: Political implications

In this conference presentation (https://ndri.curtin.edu.au/events/cdp2017/) Bacchi briefly intro... more In this conference presentation (https://ndri.curtin.edu.au/events/cdp2017/) Bacchi briefly introduces her approach to policy analysis, called "What the Problem Represented to be?" (WPR approach). She also broadens the ambit of the approach beyond policy analysis, to include the full range of governmental and knowledge practices. References to problems, explicit or implied, are politically dangerous, she argues, and need to be reined in. As an alternative she suggest a turn to problematizations. Problematizations, she argues, provide an activating factor in this production of “the real”, illustrating their crucial contribution to “the ontological turn” or, more specifically, to the argument that practices are constitutive of “objects” and “subjects”.

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