In this webinar, Professor Sarah White and Dr Shreya Jha from the Relational Wellbeing Collaborative argue that the COVID crisis demands a new, relational approach to wellbeing, that reflects what people in practice can do and be, as well as how they think and feel.
Putting relationships at the centre means recognising that people are in relationship with others, and this critically affects the opportunities they face and the choices they make. Relationships are also pivotal for livelihood strategies, especially in contexts where the state and formal sector are limited or weak.
But relationships should not just be objects of analysis. Going further, the challenge is to think relationally, to look for the connections between different parts of life, such as how interactions within and between persons are shaped by social, political, economic and ecological structures and processes, and how these in turn contribute to shaping one another.
We discuss the challenge such an approach poses to our policy and institutions, and how it might be advanced in practice.
This webinar was broadcast on 29 October 2020. It was chaired by Dr Dan Bendrups and sponsored by the ‘Wellbeing: Critical Social Perspectives’ Research Cluster, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, La Trobe University.