Abstract
In 2008, the UK government introduced Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) as a welfare policy for individuals
who are unable to work due to sickness or disability. Our research project examined the cultural landscape that has
been made ‘available’ for those living with chronic health conditions whilst claiming welfare. To increase the transparency of
a Foucauldian-inspired discursive analysis, PRISMA reporting guidelines were incorporated into a Media Framing Analysis.
News articles and policy documents were collected as data corpora. This paper outlines how this innovative approach was
developed; sharing samples of the analytical findings to illustrate what was achieved through a systematic compiling of
a data set. A genealogical approach to health-based welfare shows how temporal and dualistic discourses of illness synonymise ‘health’ with a capability for employment. Methodological considerations are explored; illuminating how a systematic
approach to data compilation can improve the transparency, rigour and potential transferability of discursive analyses.
who are unable to work due to sickness or disability. Our research project examined the cultural landscape that has
been made ‘available’ for those living with chronic health conditions whilst claiming welfare. To increase the transparency of
a Foucauldian-inspired discursive analysis, PRISMA reporting guidelines were incorporated into a Media Framing Analysis.
News articles and policy documents were collected as data corpora. This paper outlines how this innovative approach was
developed; sharing samples of the analytical findings to illustrate what was achieved through a systematic compiling of
a data set. A genealogical approach to health-based welfare shows how temporal and dualistic discourses of illness synonymise ‘health’ with a capability for employment. Methodological considerations are explored; illuminating how a systematic
approach to data compilation can improve the transparency, rigour and potential transferability of discursive analyses.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Number of pages | 26 |
| Journal | Qualitative Research in Psychology |
| Early online date | 17 Oct 2024 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | E-pub ahead of print - 17 Oct 2024 |
Bibliographical note
Copyright © 2024 The Author(s). Published with license by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. The terms on which this article has been published allow the posting of the Accepted Manuscript in a repository by the author(s) or with their consent.Keywords
- Chronic illness
- employment and support allowance
- Foucaldian discourse analysis
- media framing analysis
- PRISMA
- systemic
- welfare