Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book focuses on governance of social life and of the way certain specific social theories attempt to account for it. It aims to enhance the analysis of a particular problem: child sexual abuse. The book aims to bring questions central to contemporary discussions in social and political theory into direct relation with this important social issue, in order to examine what the governance of child sexual abuse tells us about our forms of political reasoning. Its concerns are therefore two-fold: the analysis of contemporary family-state relations, and the interrogation of different conceptual approaches to these relations and their effects. The book examines the techniques through which 'normal' family-state relations are re-inscribed following investigations into calls of 'crisis'. It engages with liberal and Critical Theory, establishing the limits of looking at state-individual relationships through these conceptual frameworks.