O olhar burocrata: estudo da cultura organizativa e administrativa burocrática do Estado Plurinacional da Bolívia a partir do estudo do Centro de Investigações Sociais da Vice-presidência do Estado

Abstract

Unlike the Weberian definition, bureaucracy for many of us is conceived as a world of routine, inefficiency, paperwork, and abuse by those who exercise it: The public sector employees. Nevertheless, this routine and inefficient world marked as illogical and irrational is actually the product of a supposedly rational model of organization and administration, also known as: bureaucracy, unknown concept to those who are not part of public institutions. How do public institutions and their employees work from within? The present research is a cultural study of the Critical Management Studies line. On the one hand articulates bureaucracy (essence) and bureaucrat (agent) under the same common thread: the application of the norm through a bureaucratic ethos. In this sense, the research aims to: Study the gaze of the public sector employees of the Administrative Unit of the Center for Social Investigations (CIS). In this way, the internal logic of operation of the organization and administration of the Plurinational State of Bolivia can be understood from their daily experiences. As a result, this qualitative approach research is a case study focused on the administrative framework of the CIS Administrative Unit which research the internal logic and the various activities experienced by individuals of this Unit. Besides, interact with various rules and documents involving administrative processes, reports, among others, and interactions with various actors at different hierarchical levels. The daily recording of civil servants was performed by applying an ethnographic approach supported by historical research. The data collection techniques were: a) the field notebook, resulting from the participant observation and the ethnographic record; and b) semi-structured interviews with CIS Administrative Unit staff. The theory employed in the research has an interdisciplinary character, which highlight the following disciplines: Anthropology, Sociology, Politics, Administration, Philosophy, Psychology, among others. Part of the research proposal’s justification is about the low production of studies on the Bolivian’s bureaucracy. This obvious fact has not been deeply researched because cultural studies in Bolivia are usually focused on valued, appreciated and exalted issues, such as folklore or local traditions and not in organizational and administrative issues since there are parts of our culture. A culture that we are not understanding and addressing because it seems “ugly” although they are part of our daily lives in a very intimate level. We are citizens governed by institutions that are organized and managed bureaucratically. These produce a culture that has been, and is deeply internalized in our daily practices