Information on the thesis

The thesis describes static and dynamic aspects of the discursive constructions of
poverty as a social problem and its political and managerial projections. It analyzes the
relationship between the socio-political dynamics of society and framing of poverty in
the contemporary Ukrainian media space within the context of the theoretical and
methodological perspective of social constructionism. The content of sociological
theorization of static and dynamic aspects of social problems in scientific discourse is
analyzed and a generalization is made of the advantages and disadvantages of two main
approaches to the problem of poverty (objectivist and subjectivist). The limitation of
the objectivist direction lies in the fact that the process of defining objective conditions
as undesirable, normal, or desirable remains exclusively economically oriented. It does not take into account the dynamism of regulatory and legal systems, the dynamics of
social discourses about certain aspects of reality.
The concept of poverty has long been absent from the context of social policy in
Ukraine during Soviet period. However, since the early 1990s, Ukrainian sociology has
begun to accumulate considerable theoretical and empirical experience on poverty. The
characteristics of poverty in Ukraine include: poverty of a large part of the population,
although maintaining a relatively high social status (level of education, qualifications);
the prevalence of poverty among the working population; poor quality of life for the
general population; the risk of impoverishment is directly proportional to the number of
children under 18 in the household; regional poverty differentiation (the rural poverty
rate is much higher than in large cities).
Comparative analysis of the discourse of analytical theories in a sociological
perspective allows to prioritize the use of the discourse-analysis of a social problem of
poverty. The following main characteristics of the discourse-analysis are defined as:
focus on the role of social agents (return of agents to the discursive process); focusing
on discourse from the point of view of the sociology of knowledge; taking into account
historical and collective dimensions of knowledge and the practice of obtaining them.
Five groups of claimmakers are identified: a group of socially unprotected
(unemployed, low-income, large families, retirees, and other segments of the
population for whom social payments make up almost the entire income); a group of
political figures, political parties and deputy factions in the Verkhovna Rada of
Ukraine; state and local government bodies; experts, scientists studying the problem of
poverty and related problems, as well as journalists; non-governmental and
international organizations.
In the third chapter of the dissertation an empirical analysis of media and expert
texts was conducted. Methodology of the discourse-analysis was chosen for the study
of the dynamics and features of the discourse of the social problem of poverty in
modern Ukrainian media. The nature of the interconnection between the media
discourse of the social problem of poverty at various stages of its life cycle and the
objective state of the phenomenon of poverty in contemporary Ukrainian society is
determined.
Key words: social problems, media space, discourse analysis, frame analysis,
poverty.