Imaginaries of social justice in contemporary Argentine subjectivity

Abstract

The imaginaries of social justice can be found in scattered fragments of historical meaning that are linked in different ways in subjectivities but do not correspond to any particular definition that can show its complete image. Our intention here is not to look for one figure of social justice, but to trace fragments of meaning that refer to that figure in a series of focus groups, in order to reconstruct the articulations in which those fragments appear, through an analysis where discourse theory and ideological critic converge. With that purpose, we offer the reconstruction of three cores that, according to our reading, can be recognized in the responses to the question about the meaning of social justice: security, equality, and freedom. The internal and relative contradictions between them reveal the tensions that characterize the imaginary order of the current Argentine society. At the same time, the careful analysis of each of these registers allows us to recognize the notorious weakening of the egalitarian content which, in Argentinean history and tradition, informed this modern principle.