On Leviathan’s Tail: Anthropological Studies of Bureaucracy and Bureaucrats

Abstract

This article precedes a selection of papers written as a result of the seminar on the anthropology of bureaucracy in modern Russia. The text offers a brief overview of the development of research into bureaucracy, where studies are mainly made in a polemic with Max Weber’s model of the “ideal” bureaucracy. It considers the most significant works that preceded the emergence of an interest in bureaucracy on the part of social scientists, written in the fields of political science and sociology and united by the method of participant observation. The authors pay attention to the difficulties in distinguishing the anthropology of bureaucracy as an independent field, which, on the one hand, is integrated into political anthropology and on the other hand, tends towards the social studies of professions. The article suggests understanding the anthropology of bureaucracy primarily as a certain viewpoint focusing on how management is implemented and how the “state” is reproduced and felt within bureaucratic institutions. The authors distinguish several popular areas in the field of social research into bureaucracy: critical works analyzing primarily the structural violence of bureaucrats against citizens through client classifications, bureaucratic arbitrariness, etc.; works that focus on the moral and affective aspect of bureaucracy, including the moral dilemmas of employees and their feelings; works devoted to the material world of bureaucracy, where documents become important participants in social interaction; research on the experience of interaction with bureaucracy as a client. In addition, the article provides an overview of existing studies (mainly) of the street-level Russian bureaucracy, performed using anthropological methods within the boundaries of different disciplines.