"The importance of perspective for suicide as a phenomenon" : -the discourse on suicide and its ideological consequences for social work with suicide prevention

In 2023 a committee directive was published by the Swedish government regarding a review of certain issues in the field of suicide prevention. The study aims to analyze the understanding of suicide as a phenomenon to explore how suicide is constructed through discourse and discuss the ideological consequences for social work. This will hopefully deepen the understanding of the suicide and suicide prevention in a Swedish context. The study adopts a social constructivist approach, and the research design was qualitative with Fairclough’s Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) paradigm. Research data in the study was two government documents regarding suicide and suicide prevention. The data was analyzed according to Fairclough’s three-dimensional model: through text, through discursive practice and through social practice in a sociocultural context using Foucault’s term power-knowledge. The study discusses the implications of the findings in a wider political and social meaning. The research finds that the competing discourses on suicide in Sweden exists within the structural perspective of understanding the phenomenon, with features of economic-, medical- and individual -discourse and that there is a shift in social politics moving away from the individual and medical/pathologic discourse on suicide. The implications for social work are concluded to be future suicide preventive interventions designed for social services, and furthermore a broader take on individuals with suicidal thoughts and tendencies