How to understand what the State is if not by observing the work that its agents do on a daily basis ? Several articles gathered in a journal file Genes develop an ethnographic approach to administrative practices, in particular in the field of policies conducted with foreigners.
If, at the dawn of the 1990s, the state remained “ A kind of historical non-object », For almost twenty years, researchers in the social sciences have renewed approaches and objects of a history today in full expansion.
This renewal is first of all an awareness of historians: “ It is by examining administrative practices and representations that state agents are made of their mission that we can understand the meaning of their action ». It is then the fruit of a rediscovery of the State by a French political science which was long “ Forgotten of the public administration ». Indeed, and despite the pioneering works of the 1970s, Françoise Dreyfus could write in 2006 that “ public administration still remains, in many ways, a virgin land for researchers ». A new step has been taken in recent years. This takes the form of a greater propensity of French sociology and political science to think of the State through administrative practices, a propensity which is itself concomitant of greater historicization of the objects of these disciplines. The contributions brought together by the journal Genes In September 2008 testified.
In a file led by François Buton and entitled “ Historical observation of administrative labor “Are published – in addition to the text of a historian, Marc Aymes, on the provincial administration of the Ottoman Empire at XIXe Century – Three articles of sociologists and political scientists. Focals and observation points differ but it is, for Françoise de Barros, Choukri Hmed and Sylvain Laurens, to study policies conducted with foreigners in France XXe century.
A widespread vision of the history of population policies, and a fortiori Those relating to foreigners, consists in seeing in the State only an institution of control, and in the administration an instrument of repression – which would be based in particular on a panoptic knowledge of the population born of filing procedures, censuses, etc. This presupposition too often leads to neglecting other fundamental aspects of administrative functioning and leads to a considerable reduction in our understanding of decision -making processes and implementation of public policies. Above all, it leads to seeing in any population policy the expression of a desire for malicious state control, and not to seek manifestations of such control that in the State and its administration – by neglecting the fundamental importance of other actors (international institutions, private companies, etc.).
The articles gathered in this file, partially allow to go beyond this reductive vision by a double approach. It is both a question of not relying only on the speeches of contemporaries and of concentrating the study on administrative practices. This implies that the researcher gives himself the means to take into account all the actors likely to intervene in the development and implementation of public policies. From the start of his contribution, Marc Aymes thus evokes a fundamental question for those who are interested in the State: this type of investigation “ Must start with the implementation of a criticism towards the conceptual tools we have – or believe – already. In the first row are the state (…). Let’s start there, therefore: administration, what to say ? (P. 5-6).
From state to administrative practices
The objective here is therefore to observe the “ work of state agents “, Understood as” Different actors in the statutory position to represent if not the State, at least an administration (central, local, decentralized), and to act on its behalf, or even to make it act (François Buton, p. 2).
Two contributions from the file propose to enter the state by the premises. Françoise de Barros is interested in the staff of several municipalities during the interwar period and during the years 1945-1984. She studies their role in the implementation of policies “ foreigners recording “, Communal prerogative until 1945. His goal is” Propose an offbeat and renewed observation angle to understand state practices “, in order to “ to deepen the knowledge of the content of administrative work from the local methods of implementing the regulations relating to the stay of foreigners (P. 42). For his part, Marc Aymes is interested in “ Provincial administrator profession »In the Ottoman Empire in the middle of XIXe century, in order to understand the modalities of “ the constitution and circulation of administrative knowledge within the Ottoman domains (P. 6).
Choukri Hmed studies the work of employees of a mixed economy company, Sonacotra, in the years 1950-1980. Through the very specific case of the accommodation of the French Muslims in Algeria, the author tries to “ Better understand the methods by which institutions placed under the supervision of the State (…) organized control and surveillance but also the disciplinarization of these populations (P. 63). Contesting the classic interpretation of a “ Deliberate project and thought as such as a postcolonial supervision of populations from the former French Empire “, Choukri Hmed wonders about the reasons for a systematic recruitment of home officials among former non-commissioned officers of colonial wars, and the terms of adopting a” Special management mode “, Which he calls” Authoritarian paternalistic (P. 68-69).
Finally, Sylvains Laurens studies the practices of agents of a central administration, the Directorate of Population and Migration (DPM), as part of the implementation of the “ Foreign workers’ return policy “From 1976, decided two years after” the official announcement of a “suspension of immigration” (P. 26). The focal displacement is probably here the least blatant, however, by adopting the point of view “ microphone From a direction of central administration, the author manages to observe ministerial practices from an original angle.
The common point of all of these contributions is therefore to consider that the understanding of the functioning of the State requires first to change focal lengths and thus be interested in those who do public action. Precision is important. It immediately puts the reader before a reality: the State does not think, the State does not act, the very use of the article defined to speak of the State or the administration must not be seen as something other than “ Simplification dresser ».
History of practices, archive practices
Only a consideration of practices makes it possible to go beyond this simplification. This observation is not new, both for history and for political science. Nevertheless, the approach developed in this file has this original that it is first of all a reflection on the ability of researchers to “ Ethnographically observe the past (Choukri Hmed, p. 72). As a result, a large place is left to reflexive analyzes as to the use of mobilized sources.
Françoise de Barros explains, for example, that her “ Investigation process was simple: to identify in the archives resulting from municipal activities the circumstances of the distinction of foreigners within municipal populations and the criteria founding such a distinction (P. 49). Her investigation based exclusively on archives, she remains lucid on the possibilities offered by this documentation: “ If all the archives can be made up of the acts that have produced them, all do not allow any sociological interpretation to be satisfied (P. 52). The sociologist devotes ten pages to a critical examination of the use of her sources, and justifies her choice not to use an ethnographic observation. Françoise de Barros thus convinces the reader of the relevance of her approach, alone capable of highlighting “ the weight of practices (client) which, without it, would have been reduced because of their unatalized character (P. 58).
Choukri Hmed mobilizes “ heterogeneous empirical materials “(P. 72), but above all develops his reflection around” Interview status in the “Historical Observation” survey (P. 73). The pages he devotes to “ Analysis of the investigation situation »Thus offer a very enlightening return on the conditions of production of such a material for research. They constitute, in particular, an edifying testimony on the way in which a researcher must sometimes manage certain words of his interlocutors to carry out empirical research. The author thus explains that he was sometimes “ summoned to acquiesce or comply with virulent invectives against “Muslims” “, The only means of” Put its “Maghreb” label to the background for the benefit of that “academic” “In order to access” To a discourse certainly imbued with contempt and / or deep condescension, but also cleared, disintent and awarded (P. 76).
Discretionary power and state “ out of law »»
Sylvain Laurens studies the methods of processing requests for return to France from foreigners “ income in the country “(P. 27) As part of the policy of helping the return of the mid -1970s. He exposed the multiple interests of a” Micro-analysis of scribbled words on the sidelines of official decisions ». This allows him not to register in “ A jurissed approach, which would limit historical work to official texts only “And who would reduce” the activity of state agents to conformation in the regulations (P. 38). Following this basic rule of the study of administrative archives allows the author to underline the importance of “ moral or humanitarian considerations »Agents responsible for this activity.
However, the interest of this article seems to us to be elsewhere. Sylvain Laurens proposes to be interested in the question of discretionary power, not of “ small civil servants ” Or “ Window office “, But senior officials, heard like” office managers, sub-directors or even central administration directors (P. 29). The author thus offers an edifying table of what administrative practices can be in illegality.
By four judgments made between July and November 1978, the Council of State canceled certain provisions of the policy “ Return help ». Therefore, he became “ illegal for agents of the DPM to ban a return to France or claim the sums allocated (P. 29). Sylvain Laurens explains that, therefore, “ the administrative work carried out by the agents of the DPM is carried out under the permanent fear of being taken in legally default, but above all publicly, by applicants or their supporters (P. 36-37). The practices of these officials are then mainly of the management of this illegality – that only the “ scratchy words Allow the author to unveil.
This issue of Genes thus recalls the contribution of the social sciences to a finer understanding of the implementation of public policies (past or current), and a fortiori Those concerning foreigners, when researchers adopt a more concerned approach to practices than ideological discourses (past or current).