Call for papers for the Dossier “Ethnographies of activism, militancias and bureaucracies in the field of rights: Interventions and incidence”

We are interested in inviting researchers who analyze the various ways activism and militancias intertwine with the management and formulation of public policies in justice and security administration to contribute to this Dossier. This proposal seeks to gather works that explore how conflict situations and rights mobilization processes in different empirical settings, influence the daily work of state bureaucracies and conflict management strategies.

The interest in receiving articles based on these ethnographies lies in the opportunity to understand, through them, the specific ways in which groups and social collectives engage in politics, the local management practices developed by specialized bureaucracies, with their knowledge and governance technologies, the localized expressions of “statehood”, the emergence of “institutional activism” and the permeability to “advocacy”. Additionally, if relevant, how researchers are involved in these processes.

Focusing the call for papers to this Dossier in articles that derive from ethnographies exploring the complex links between activism, militancias, and bureaucracies in the field of demands for rights and conflict situations, their impact on bureaucracies' performance and public policymaking, aligns with our interest in deepening the debate on local ways of institutional management and administration of conflict, as well as on the types of mobilization and organized collective action. This is particularly relevant when considering local reinterpretations of universal and universalizing values and discourses, such as human rights.

At the same time, this proposal aims to bring together works that, particularly in the region and in recent years, have contributed to breaking down certain boundaries between traditionally distinct topics that often follow parallel tracks, such as activism and militancias; bureaucracies and public policies; collective action and social movements; and law, justice and security.

In this way, through this Dossier, we are interested in contributing to the discussion surrounding the discordances between right demands and institutional approaches to conflict management as they reveal different power dynamics according to the audiences they target, while also allowing for a critical examination of homogenizing readings and perspectives of the State, particularly through ethnographies of bureaucracies or statehood.

Considering evaluation criteria applied to scientific journals, up to 50% of the articles may be authored by doctoral students; the remaining articles must include at least one author with a doctoral degree. All submissions will undergo a blind review process by external referees, following the journal's policy. To reflect the diversity of theoretical and methodological approaches across different empirical fields and topics, articles from Anthropology and Social Sciences will be given preference, provided they adhere to the criterion of externality to the UFF.

Organizers: María Victoria Pita (CONICET/ICA-UBA/Argentina) and Ana Paula Mendes de Miranda (UFF/Brazil).

Deadline: March 10, 2025.

NOTE: As we have more than one open call, it is mandatory to indicate in the field “Comments to editors” that the submission is for the Dossier “Ethnographies of activisms, militancias and bureaucracies”.

Contributions can be sent until March 10, 2025 through the electronic system of the journal: https://periodicos.uff.br/antropolitica/about/submissions#onlineSubmissions