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- Convenor:
-
Pauline Jarroux
(Rouen University)
Send message to Convenor
- Format:
- Panels
- Location:
- KH102
- Start time:
- 30 June, 2017 at
Time zone: Europe/Zurich
- Session slots:
- 1
Short Abstract:
This panel aims at enriching studies of African bureaucrats and professional cultures through the question of emotions at work.
Long Abstract:
The panel objective is to enrich and extend studies of African bureaucrats through the question of feelings and emotions at work. The archetypal figure of the authoritarian bureaucrat, which dates back to colonisation, does not leave much room for more nuanced and complex analyses based on the actors' practices and reflexivity. Two lines of research could be developed :
-Emotions and feelings as effects of the work itself : as elsewhere, African bureaucrats at work have to face stress, fear, pity, disgust, compassion… Which strategies do they possibly pursue then ? Moreover, how do they deal with the day-to-day contradictions of working in under-staffed and under-equipped services and how do their feelings inform us about their professional practices and cultures ?
-Emotions as working instruments : many professions rely on prescribed emotions and codes of conduct. How do they are understood and put into practice, despite evidence for privilegism, favors and corruption in the bureaucratic relationship ? Asides, development projects and managerial reforms tend to impose new « feeling rules » : the participative approach and its derivatives imply a break with the model of the authoritative bureaucrat. What are the consequences of these new norms on professional practices, cultures and imaginaries ?
Accepted papers:
Session 1Tessa Diphoorn (Utrecht University)
Paper short abstract:
This paper focuses on how emotions shape intrastate interactions between different state institutions in Kenya.
Paper long abstract:
Although much research has been conducted on statehood in Africa, much work remains to be done about the ways in which different state institutions and officials interact in co-creating ideas and practices of the state and how emotions shape the way that state officials interact with each other. In this paper, I intend to explore how a specific set of state bureaucrats in Kenya experience their daily work and more specifically, their interactions with other state officials. I will focus on the emotions and experiences of state employees working for the Independent Policing Oversight Authority (IPOA), a state institution that was established in 2012 to regulate and monitor misconduct of the Kenyan police. Armed with the primary mandate of regulating the practices of another state body, these intra-state interactions are marked by numerous conflicting emotions of frustration, hope and perseverance. By focusing on 'emotions at work', this paper aims to further uncover how intrastate interactions are shaped by emotions and how these influence the performance of state practices.
Mehdi Labzae (CEDEJ - Cairo)
Paper short abstract:
The paper looks at Ethiopian civil servants' reactions to the harsh political control put in force by the ruling party in the public service.
Paper long abstract:
Ethiopian civil servants work in a highly politicized environment. The Ethiopian Peoples' Revolutionary Democratic Front, ruling party since 1991, has developed mechanisms of political control that constraint bureaucrats in their everyday work. Although party membership is not compulsory for public servants, they can hardly climb the hierarchy in the civil service without being party members. Party officials decide about the bureaucrats' carriers and control their actions, most notably through an evaluation process called gimgema. Born when the EPRDF was still a guerrilla movement, the gimgema was first a socialist practice of evaluation through public criticism and self-criticism. Nowadays, it perfectly fits with neoliberal injunctions to transparency and commitment, but it is practiced in a highly politicised state apparel where the EPRDF leaves little room for critique. Civil servants failing at the gimgema can be dismissed or jailed.
The paper looks at how civil servants react to this harsh political control. While some of them enrol in party structures to protect themselves from political interferences, many prefer to keep away from politics, at the risk of being enrolled by force or punished for their lack of commitment. If evaluations are a stressful time for many, some agents use it to settle personal conflicts. The paper stresses the consequences of political control on the public agents' way of handling their daily work, in a context where any initiative and action can be interpreted as a fault. Eventually, the paper looks at opposition, diverting and avoidance strategies put in force by some agents.
Thomas Lesaffre (Public Affaire Research Institut )
Paper short abstract:
The presentation will consider “bureaucrat emotions” as data set in order to analyze institutional failure, reproduction, or resistance
Paper long abstract:
Based on two years' research conducted in South Africa around the relation between local governance and political violence, this presentation aims to emphasize the role of an administrator's emotions in institutional change or reproduction at a local level.
In Mogalakwena, violence between different ruling party factions has led to tremendous stress for bureaucrats. The presentation will explore how new political factions re-enforce their power into administration in order to define the relation between emotions and institutional reproduction/change at a micro level. In a context where the fundamental freedom to talk or express memories and ideas is forgiven; emotions have to be considered as a data base in order to understand the maintenance and reproduction of institutions.
By looking at the administrative side of the political violence, the author will show and define the deeply damaging effect that produces this violence in what should be a routinized bureaucratic environment. After observing the transformation and the re-enforcement inside the institutions of a power base on violence to a disciplinary power, the presentation will consider "bureaucrat emotions" as data set in order to analyze institutional failure in order to organize and reduce uncertainty around bureaucrat transactions.
The presentation will argue that the suffering that officials were enduring to see the erosion of rules as well as organizational routines that they had put in place can be understood as a way for the disciplinary power to re-insert violence in to the institutions.