The Sociology of Punishment (undergraduate level), Current Criminological Theory (graduate level)

Given a conception of the actor as deeply implicated in power structures, recent research projects have traced specific aspects of agency; the conditions for critical transcendence (Critique and cognitive capacities: Towards an action-oriented model) and the regressive satisfaction of desire through punishment (The Pleasure of Punishment). A current project is located in the intersection of philosophy and social science and investigates the transformative potential of desire. The aim is to advance a critical theory of desire and its role in societal conflicts. So far one publication (Recognition of struggle: Transcending the oppressive dynamics of desire). A future monograph will discuss the three most influential philosophical traditions and make use of existing social research to understand the transformative potential of desire.

A selection from Stockholm University publication database

• Neoliberal security provision

  2020. Magnus Hörnqvist. Punishment & Society 22 (2), 227-246

  Article

  The article develops a new understanding of neoliberal security provision on the basis of available accounts of three different “states”; the penal state, the regulatory state, and the activating welfare state. I argue that these forms of state intervention provide individuals with security in the sense that anxiety is temporarily alleviated, while stabilizing the conflictual dynamic of global power structures. Marketization and organizational control account for the specifically neoliberal character. Such an understanding matters because it directs attention to the dynamic between state practices and individual experience, and the multitude of mechanisms, which not only promise but also provide security, however temporary and partial.

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• Recognition of struggle: Transcending the oppressive dynamics of desire

  2023. Magnus Hörnqvist. Constellations

  Article

  The objective of this article is to see whether desire for recognition might contain an emancipatory aspect. Could this desire be a political ally? The argumentative strategy is to fully acknowledge the oppressive mechanisms at work before trying to find a way to other outcomes, including emancipation, with which desire for recognition has been associated in the tradition from Hegel. Through a re-interpretation of the master-and-slave dialectic, supplemented by sociological research on status expectations, I suggest a way out of the vicious circle, where desire produced by power finds satisfaction through a preexisting other, resulting in an endless dynamic of compulsive conformity and regressive assertion of status. The hold of this dynamic must not be underestimated, yet, as I argue, both desire and what satisfies desire are liable to change, through struggle. The transformation of the generalized other, which provides recognition, is seen to be a crucial feature of all collective struggle. The very source of recognition is transformed, behind the backs of the actors, in turn affecting their desire. This can but must not lead to the emancipatory outcomes which are traditionally tied to recognition in the Hegelian tradition.

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• Critique and cognitive capacities: Towards an action-oriented model

  2022. Magnus Hörnqvist. Philosophy & Social Criticism 48 (1), 62-85

  Article

  In response to an impasse, articulated in the late 1980s, the cognitive capacities of ordinary people assumed central place in contemporary critical social theory. The participants' perspective gained precedence over scientific standards branded as external. The notion of cognition, however, went unchallenged. This article continues the move away from external standards, and discusses two models of critique, which differ based on their underlying notions of cognition. The representational model builds on cognitive content, misrecognition and normativity; three features which are illustrated with positions adopted by prominent exponents of critical social theory. An alternative understanding relies on action-oriented disclosure and the participants' basic familiarity with the social world. On this reading, what clashes with unequal structures is skilful coping, rather than representations and normative standards. The action-oriented approach may overcome the dilemma of understanding both the impact and the possible transcendence of unequal structures, although it cannot ultimately replace representational critique.

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• The Pleasure of Punishment

  2021. Magnus Hörnqvist.

  Book

  Based on a reading of contemporary philosophical arguments, this book accounts for how punishment has provided audiences with pleasure in different historical contexts. Watching tragedies, contemplating hell, attending executions, or imagining prisons have generated pleasure, according to contemporary observers, in ancient Greece, in medieval Catholic Europe, in the early-modern absolutist states, and in the post-1968 Western world.

  The pleasure was often judged morally problematic, and raised questions about which desires were satisfied, and what the enjoyment was like. This book offers a research synthesis that ties together existing work on the pleasure of punishment. It considers how the shared joys of punishment gradually disappeared from the public view at a precise historic conjuncture, and explores whether arguments about the carnivalesque character of cruelty can provide support for the continued existence of penal pleasure. Towards the end of this book, the reader will discover, if willing to go along and follow desire to places which are full of pain and suffering, that deeply entwined with the desire for punishment, there is also the desire for social justice.

  An accessible and compelling read, this book will appeal to students and scholars of criminology, sociology, philosophy and all those interested in the pleasures of punishment.

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• Nordic criminal justice in a global context: practices and promotion of exceptionalism

  2022. Mikkel Jarle Christensen, Kjersti Lohne, Magnus Hörnqvist.

  Book

  This book critically investigates Nordic criminal justice as a global role model.

  Not taking this role for granted, the chapters of the book analyze how Nordic approaches to criminal justice were folded into global contexts, and how patterns of promotion were built around perceptions that these approaches also had a particular value for other criminal justice systems. Specific actors, both internal and external to the region itself, have branded Nordic criminal justice as a form of ‘penal exceptionalism’ associated with human rights, universalistic welfare, and social cohesion. The book shows how building and using the brand of Nordic criminal justice allowed stakeholders to champion specific forms of crime control across a variety of criminal justice areas in both domestic and international settings.

  The book will be of interest to scholars and students of criminal justice, international law and justice, Nordic and Scandinavian studies, and more widely to the social sciences and humanities.

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Show all publications by Magnus Hörnqvist at Stockholm University