Paper short abstract:

This paper explores the cultural logic of public sector bureaucracies and the instrumental reasons why anthropology’s attempts to communicate with this audience often result in parallel talk.

Paper long abstract:

In Australia opponents of applied anthropology claim it is aligned to and can be described as a project of the state. Yet evidence of an ethnographic influence is weak in policy-making. Why has the wealth of available ethnographic knowledge of Indigenous communities had only a peripheral impact on programs to engage with, and deliver benefits to, Indigenous communities?

I argue that the lack of synergy between what is known of contemporary Indigenous life styles and every day experience and how this is framed when bureaucracies design Indigenous programs can be thought of as "parallel talk" - a condition partly the result of anthropology's failure to apply its own methods, including critical scrutiny to engagement with the state, and partly the result of principles and practices behind how public sector bureaucracies communicate with their external and internal audiences.

The paper draws on experience working in public sector agencies together with recent literature critiquing the assumptions informing Indigenous policy making, management values and practice in these institutions. It outlines dimensions of this parallel talk, including how anthropology limits its capacity to bring its analyses to others by the manner in which it addresses audiences outside the academy from within its own cultural logic.