Mobility and Marginalization

1
Mobility and Marginalization

• Definition of key terms
• Debates
• Conclusion

2

• Marginalization the prcesses that create groups
  of people who in one way or another and to
  varying extents are excluded from participation
  in the main currents of social life, to which
  they are oriented despite their marginality
  (Halvorsen 19959 in Kristensen ?3)
• Kristenses identifies 4 dimentions of this
  margialization
• it is a process
• It is unwanted, involuntary
• it requires a certain degree of exculsion from
  participation in different areas of society
• Being marginalized doesnt mean to be totally
  excluded
• Rooted in -----lt----- gt-----Marginal ---- lt
  ----gt----Excluded

3

• Mobility implies the process of moving
  from/moving to at different speeds and in
  different forms
• Aspects mobility
• Social mobility The way individuals or groups
  move upwards or downwards from one status or
  class position to another within the social
  hierarchy (will not be discussed in this
  presentation). (http//www.allwords.com/word-socia
  l20mobility.html)
• Phyisical mobility the actual physical movement
  of people from one place to another and how it
  determines different degrees of
  integration/exculsion of the people involved
  (http//www.allwords.com/word-social20mobility.ht
  ml)
• Virtual mobility the substitution of travel
  through ICT based communication (Arnfalk P.
  20025)

4
Mobility Related Marginalization

• Nowadays we are always on the move () even if
  physicaly bodily, we stay put (Bauman 199877)
• Different levels of mobility have a visible
  influence on the process of marginalization(
  Kenyon 2004)
• Too little (physical) mobility people get
  excluded from participation because of not enough
  mobility and the ones who are already
  marginalized experience exclusion from mobility.
  The exclusion is felt both ways in terms of
  - lack of access in social participation
• - affordability expensive movement
• - availabilty
• Too much (physical) mobility(Hypermobility)
  also leads to exclusion from social participation
• - it excludes even more the
  already disadvantaged people
• - it leads to the polarisation of
  society

5

• Bauam talks about two worlds that fit the
  dichotomy too much/too little mobility the
  globally mobile and the the locally tied
• For the first world, the world of the globally
  mobile the space has lost its constraining
  quality and is eassily traversed in both its real
  and virtual renditions. For the second world, the
  world of the locally tied, of those barred from
  moving and thus bound to bear passively whatever
  change may be visited on the locality they are
  tied to, the real space is fast closing up. This
  is a kind of deprivation which is made yet more
  painful by the obstrusive media display of the
  space conquest and of the virtual accessibility
  of distances that stay stubbornly unreachable in
  non-virtual reality (Bauman199888)

6

• Virtual mobility (the internet) could provide a
  solution to the exclusionarry disbenefits of
  too little and too much mobility by
• - causing a decrease in phisical
  mobility
• - the use of the internet will have social
  positive effects
• - it could substitute or supplement
  physical mobility by providing
  non-mobile means of access to participation
  (Kenyon 20044)
• - it increases acess (therefore inclusion)

7

• BUT
• There is more evidence to support the hypothesis
  that virtual mobility could actually increase
  even more social exclusion
• - lack of human relations isolation
• - decline of community reduces civic contact
• - lack of face to face contact
• - increased marginalization of those who are
  offline
• - the problem of accessibility and
  affordability in order to create the
  infrastructure that would provide people with
  access to virtual mobility a big financial effort
  is needed and in the already disadvantaged zones
  such investiments are not economicaly viable
  (profitable) therefore those zones risk to be
  even more marginalized

8
Concluding remarks

• Marginalization it is not an isolated process
• Mobility and Marginalization are very closely
  linked and they influence one another
• A solution to the mobilty related marginalization
  hasnt been found yet virtual mobility as shown
  brings up a lot of risks
• No matter how we put it marginalized groups will
  always exist in our types of society