At the Heart of the State: The Moral World of Institutions

by Didier Fassin

The state is often regarded as an abstract and neutral bureaucratic entity. Against this common sense idea, At the Heart of the State argues that it is also a concrete and situated reality, embodied in the work of its agents and inscribed in the issues of its time. 



The result of a five-year investigation conducted by ten scholars, this book describes and analyses the police, the court system, the prison apparatus, the social services, and mental health facilities in France. Combining genealogy and ethnography, its authors show that these state institutions do not simply implement laws, rules and procedures: they mobilise values and affects, judgements and emotions. In other words, they reflect the morality of the state. 



Of immense interest to both social scientists and political theorists, this work will make an important contribution to the ever expanding literature on the contemporary state.

Genres: Politics, Anthropology

312 pages, Hardcover

Published July 15, 2015

About the author

Didier Fassin is a French anthropologist and sociologist. He is currently the James D. Wolfensohn Professor of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton and holds a Direction of Studies in Political and Moral Anthropology at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris.

Reviews

[Rallie · Rating 3 out of 5]

The chapters in this book have some interesting contributions to conversations regarding state institutions, and Fassin's introduction perfectly sets the stage by explaining the dialectical perspective on structure/agent being employed in these studies. Methodologically it is a good book. However, from the perspective of analysis there appears to be a need to incorporate more "steps" in the dialectic. Not enough "dancers" (agents) are considered.