How do social partnerships construct social problems? A social-symbolic work perspective

In the world of social partnerships, one important research puzzle that still remains is concerned with how partners construct the social problems that the partnership is intended to address. To explore this, we draw upon the social-symbolic work literature that defines it as purposeful work carried out by individuals or groups to influence social-symbolic objects (Lawrence & Phillips, 2019), and we ask the following: How does social-symbolic work influence the way in which partnership members construct the social problem? Also, how does this influence the outcomes of the partnerships? Comparing two case studies of social partnership that address gender inequality in Turkey, we found that relational and practice work influenced the social construction of the issue. Our findings illustrate that extensive relational work and in-depth practice work led to embedded social construction of the problem (i.e. where partnership considered the multi-layered interdependencies of social structures and complex societal and cultural dynamics surrounding the problem). In contrast, limited relational work and shallow practice work led to disembedded social construction of the problem, which overlooked the complex, interrelated social structures and cultural context that created, and consistently influenced, the problem. Overall, our research contributes to the research on social issues by unpacking the social construction process in partnerships and the social-symbolic work literature by highlighting the lived experience of social-symbolic work and emphasizing social-symbolic work as embodied and human work.