Call for papers for the Dossier “Anthropology of public policy: ethnographies among agents, users, and services”

In recent decades, the idea has taken hold that models for designing, implementing, and evaluating public policies based solely on indicators and quantitative data are insufficient to account for the complexities and contradictions present in the scenarios for which a series of governmental and non-governmental programs are designed. Since 1980, in the political science literature, Michael Lipsky (2019) has emphasized the crucial role of “street-level bureaucrats” in the success or failure of certain services. More recently, a number of experts in the fields of Public Health, Public Administration, Economics, Law, and other applied social sciences have been refining theories and methodologies in this field of research in order to increasingly sophisticate the debate on the subject. 

In general, these authors affirm that it is necessary to understand and take into account the logic, moral values, needs, and motivations of those who are directly involved in the situation in which intervention is desired. From this perspective, “fieldwork” is considered fundamental and indispensable, since only through this approach is it possible to gain a deep understanding of the daily reality of the subjects and, with this, to develop actions and projects that are both less costly and more effective. Examples of such proposals can be found in works such as those by historian Marcos Cueto (2007) on the implementation of the malaria eradication program in Mexico, and by Nobel Prize winners in Economics Abhijit V. Banerjee and Esther Duflo (2020), who advocate fieldwork as an essential step in the process of designing and executing economic plans, as well as in defining public spending.

Although designed for a specific purpose, it is not uncommon for the target audience of a social program or government action to appropriate tools, resources, and technologies in creative ways that were not anticipated by public policy experts. Such episodes of perplexity in the face of the unexpected use and/or results of a given instrument are recurrent among those who work with initiatives such as cash transfers—who are surprised when individuals use the money they receive to purchase what they consider “superfluous” items rather than what they see as “basic necessities”— and also among managers in other planning sectors, such as those responsible for developing guidelines for the rational use of medicines purchased with public funds, who need to be attentive to the most diverse and inventive ways in which people resort to and handle certain medications.

What we see today is that the implementation of a general public policy will always encounter certain obstacles and dilemmas in particular contexts—such as the difficulties faced in creating a user registry through a mobile app in a region where more than half of the people do not have regular access to the internet (Fonseca, Scalco, and Castro, 2018; Bachtold, 2016). These obstacles are due, on the one hand, to the social, cultural, and infrastructural conditions that characterize the territories and/or populations targeted by a given project—often unknown to experts in public policy formulation and implementation—and, on the other hand, to the fact that people are not automatons who all respond equally to a certain stimulus and always react in the same way. In other words, every public policy has to deal with an essentially human element, whose behaviors, reactions, and feelings cannot be predicted with precision. 

In the field of anthropology, authors have contributed to destabilizing and questioning ideas consolidated in other disciplines that public policies only respond to the interests of a community that is seen as the sum of rational individuals who always act based on a certain assessment of costs and benefits, as discussed by Antonio Carlos de Souza Lima and João Paulo Macedo e Castro (2015). Using their classic tools and practical and epistemological assumptions, anthropologists seek to emphasize that the processes of formulating and implementing public policies are marked by complexities, nuances, and various contradictions. Furthermore, by focusing on the “native point of view” and the way people experience policies in their daily lives—from design to effects—anthropology aims to understand what a public policy “means” to those who access it (or are prevented from accessing it) and/or are its clients/users (Shore, 2010). It also highlights how the state is rethought, updated, and questioned in the daily and creative practices of the people who dialogue with it, bet on it, and fight for it (Das and Poole, 2004; Borges, 2005; Ahlert, 2022).

With this in mind, the dossier aims to bring together articles by researchers who adopt an anthropological/ethnographic approach in their investigation and discussion of the state and its practical forms of action that characterize public policies. Our idea is to highlight how the theoretical and methodological framework for conducting fieldwork—especially ethnographic fieldwork—can be applied not only to study, but above all to the processes of agenda setting, formulation, implementation, and analysis of public policies. With this, we want to bring together authors who work with policies in different areas of state administration: income, health, affirmative action, transportation, urban infrastructure, public safety, etc. The central idea guiding our proposal is that ethnography has a high capacity to characterize in detail and contextually how so-called “public problems” are configured, the actors involved, the correlations of power, internal and external disputes, among other issues involved in the theme. In addition, we also intend to bring texts that highlight the participation of anthropologists in applied research in the field of politics and their assistance in producing more effective solutions that are responsive and committed to the real needs of people. Finally, we are interested in the challenges that dialogue and engagement with public policy can bring to anthropology.

 

References

AHLERT, Martina. Precisão e política: algumas considerações etnográficas a partir de Codó (Maranhão). Civitas, Porto Alegre, n. 22, p. 1-12, 2022.

BANERJEE, Abhijit; DUFLO, Esther. Boa economia para tempos difíceis. Rio de Janeiro: Zahar, 2020.

BACHTOLD, Isabele. Quando o Estado encontra suas margens: considerações etnográficas sobre um mutirão da estratégia de Busca Ativa no estado do Pará. Horizontes Antropológicos, Porto Alegre, ano 22, n. 46, p. 273-301, 2016.

BORGES, Antonádia. Sobre pessoas e variáveis: etnografia de uma crença política. Mana, Rio de Janeiro, n. 11, v. 1, p. 67-93, 2005.

CUETO, Marcos. Cold war, deadly fevers: malaria eradication in Mexico, 1955-1975. Washington: Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 2007.

DAS, Venna. POOLE, Deborah (ed.). Anthropology in the Margins of the State. Santa Fe: School of American Research Press, 2004.

FONSECA, Claudia. SCALCO, Lúcia. CASTRO, Helisa Canfield de. Etnografia de uma política pública: controle social pela mobilização popular. Horizontes Antropológicos, Porto Alegre, ano 24, n. 50, p. 271-303, 2018.

LIPSKY, Michael. Burocracia de nível de rua: dilemas do indivíduo nos serviços públicos. Brasília: Enap, 2019.

SHORE, Cris. La antropología y el estudio de la política pública: reflexiones sobre la ‘formulación’ de las políticas. Antípoda, [s. l.], n. 10, p. 21-49, 2010.

SOUZA LIMA, Antonio Carlos de; CASTRO, João Paulo Macedo e. Notas para uma abordagem antropológica da(s) Política(s) Pública(s). Anthropológicas, [s. l.], v. 26, n. 2, p. 17-54, 2015.

 

Organizers: Lucas Freire (UERJ/Brazil) and Martina Ahlert (UFMA/Brazil)

Deadline: December 16, 2025.

 

NOTE: As we have more than one open call, it is mandatory to indicate in the “Comments to the editors” field that the submission is for the Dossier “Anthropology of Public Policy”.

Contributions can be sent until December 16, 2025, through the journal's electronic system: https://periodicos.uff.br/antropolitica/about/submissions#onlineSubmissions