Producir lazo, organizar “la olla” y “contener” a otros/as. Experiencias de cuidado sociocomunitario durante la pandemia de la covid-19 en el AMBA (Argentina)

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to describe and analyze the reconversion experiences of four social organizations to sustain the social bond and collective care in popular neighborhoods of the Metropolitan Area of Buenos Aires (AMBA), Argentina, during the Covid-19 pandemic. Based on qualitative research work with an ethnographic approach, conducted remotely between July and September 2020, we i) reconstructed the social context and characterized the activities of the socio-community organizations studied in AMBA, before and during the pandemic; ii) sketched images such as the collective “la olla” organization, which describe the community provision of care; and iii) showed how, in the context of restricted movement, the organizations had to deploy tactics to “contain,” “accompany” and take care of themselves and others. In line with debates about an economy of care, which produces values surreptitiously appropriated by the rest of the economy, this paper focuses on those resulting from socio-community practices related to: food —“la olla” and “la fila”—, health, and socio-affective —“containment”—. This proposal is intended to contribute to the theoretical-political field of discussion, in which it is situated, on the paradox between the centrality of (socio-community) care, for the production of social welfare, and its insufficient recognition in economic, social, and political terms. Methodologically, the paper portrays the challenges —for social research— of reading and interpreting practices when co-presenciality is technologically mediated.

Keywords

• care
• communitarian organizations
• low-income neighborhoods
• pandemic
• recognition
• values