Gloria Ziglioli

• Ziglioli, Gloria (2025). The Technofix Illusion. A Discourse Analysis of Norway's Welfare Technology Policy and the Transformation of Eldercare. Nordisk välfärdsforskning | Nordic Welfare Research. 11(1), p. 1–22. doi: 10.18261/nwr.11.1.1. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  This study critically interrogates the “welfare technology as a solution” discourse in Norwegian national health and care policy, focusing on how it comes to be in relation to the framing of the care crisis as a particular kind of problem and the discursive constitution of elderly people as policy subjects. The research contributes to ongoing discussion about the impact of neoliberal governance in shaping the Norwegian welfare state, with a specific focus on investigating how welfare technology policy facilitates this shift. Employing Carol Bacchi’s post-structural “What’s the Problem Represented to Be” analytical framework to analyze six national healthcare policy documents, this study reveals a “technofix” logic that consolidates and mobilizes the illusion that technological solutions can solve the care crisis, which is peculiarly framed as the result of a conservative, inadequate care sector and passive care recipients. The care sector of tomorrow is discursively constructed as inevitably transformed through digital solutions that will compensate for traditional inefficiencies. The new elderly generation is invested with greater responsibilities for self-care, independence, and active aging, supported by welfare technology. Altogether, these findings reveal how technofix discursive frames present both overromanticized and silenced perspectives, ultimately shaping the understanding of care (including care agents, arrangements, practices, and relationships) and the role of the welfare state.

• Machin, Amanda Margaret; Ziglioli, Gloria; Schojan, Fabio & Ruser, Alexander (2025). Imaginaries of the sustainable state in Europe: ecological modernity, environmental stewardship, energy security, and green growth. Sustainability: Science, Practice, & Policy. 21(1). doi: 10.1080/15487733.2025.2566658. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  State governments around the world have pledged to decarbonize their economies and facilitate a sustainability transformation. But transformation requires imagination; the possibilities for the state to promote, forge, or obstruct a path toward a more sustainable future hinge not only on the ability to make strategic policy revisions but more fundamentally on the political imaginaries that help to configure the expectations of policymakers and the public about what is possible and feasible—and what is not. This article offers a comparative analysis of imaginaries of the “sustainable state” appearing in key policy documents and strategies in four countries. Using critical discourse analysis, we map four imaginaries: ecological modernity in Germany; ecological stewardship in Norway, energy security in Italy, and green growth in the UK. The article thus offers insight into the different expectations in relation to agency, technology, temporality, and rationality in driving and maintaining sustainability and reflects upon the impact of these imaginaries. Our analysis indicates that while these imaginaries of the sustainable state vary significantly, they generally promote technological innovation and market mechanisms and cover up some of the inevitable disagreements and challenges of transformation.

• Ziglioli, Gloria; Banfi, Giulia & Alhassan, Alhassan Yakubu (2025). From Tool to Partner: Exploring Common Patterns of Human-AI Collaboration Among PhD Students in Social Sciences. In Hacker, Philipp (Eds.), Oxford Intersections: AI in Society. Oxford University Press. ISSN 9780198945215. doi: 10.1093/9780198945215.003.0147. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  This study contributes new insights into how PhD students in the social sciences use AI tools in research, focusing on how they select and collaborate with AI to support and enhance their academic workflows. The authors conducted a survey among PhD students in eight countries (Italy, Norway, Belgium, the United Kingdom, Spain, Netherlands, France, and Estonia), combining quantitative descriptive analysis with qualitative critical discourse analysis. The findings reveal that most respondents began their PhDs after 2022, coinciding with the public availability of generative AI tools. ChatGPT emerged as the most frequently used, often alongside DeepL, Elicit, and SciSpace, with use cases tailored to individual research tasks. Although most participants used the free versions, some opted for paid models. The article identifies four typologies of AI agency—teaching agent, subordinate assistant, cognitive partner, and substitutive partner—reflecting different patterns of human-AI collaboration. AI is primarily used for academic writing, with background research and literature reviews as secondary uses. While originality was rated low, translation and writing support were seen as most beneficial. These findings underscore the versatility of AI and the evolving dynamics of co-produced knowledge in academia.

• Ziglioli, Gloria & Alhassan, Alhassan Yakubu (2022). Nethnography and Social Network Analysis for Studying Online Social Space. In Punziano, Gabriella & Paoli, Angela Delli (Ed.), Handbook of Research on Advanced Research Methodologies for a Digital Society. IGI Global. ISSN 9781799884743. p. 227–247. doi: 10.4018/978-1-7998-8473-6.ch015. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  This chapter contributes to the current methodological debate on digital, internet-based studies in social research. Based upon an introductive analysis of the research's perspectives, trajectories, and stages that have brought the online social spaces into social research, the chapter focuses on the advantages of combining quanti-quali approaches for approaching online complexity. In particular, the authors offer a deep discussion concerning the value, the methodological, and ethical challenges of netnography and social network analysis (SNA) methods for inquiring online social research by proposing a possible emerging methodological framework guiding further empirical studies.

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• Tømte, Cathrine Edelhard; Trondal, Jarle; Ziglioli, Gloria & Ruser, Alexander (2026). Introduction to digital transformations. In Tømte, Cathrine Edelhard; Trondal, Jarle & Ruser, Alexander (Ed.), Digital Transformations. Social and Ethical Consequnces of Rapid Technological Change. Edward Elgar Publishing. ISSN 9781035361212. p. 1–15. doi: 10.4337/9781035361229.00005. Full text in Research Archive

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