Bureaucractic (De/con)textualizations. Tensions around Interactions and Documentary Practices in Mexico City’s Transportation Bureaucracy
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.22380/2539472X.2590Keywords:
bureaucracy; documentary practices or documents; transparency; corruption; bureaucratic interactions.Abstract
Based on fieldwork in Mexico City's Ministry of Mobility, this article analyzes the link between the interactions and negotiations that transport bureaucrats hold with different actors, such as public transport concessionaires, on the one hand, and the documentary practices aimed at recording what happens in those meetings, on the other. We argue that the writing of various documentary artifacts-circulars, official letters, minutes of meetings-is linked to the mandates of transparency and the fight against corruption. To translate what happened in face-to-face interactions into written documents that become auditable testimonies, bureaucrats employ various discursive strategies such as impersonality, obliteration of the details of negotiations, and paralinguistic signs. These strategies are aimed at cleaning up the context and, at the same time, complying with the bureaucratic formalities of the documentary record.
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