Events

Vincent Dubois:

The field of institutions from below

11th of February 2026

Discussant : Virgilio Pereira, tbc

The field of institutions can be defined after the characteristics of institutions and after the types of relationships they have one with another. Here I propose another perspective, considering the institutional field from the point of view of the spaces of the users and uses of institutions. Based on the statistical re-processing of circa 200 qualitative interviews conducted among members of the lower classes in the urban district of Strasbourg, France, this paper proposes an exploratory mapping of who has to do with which institutions, how, and with what type of effects. By doing so, I will shed light “from below” on the structures of the institutional field.

Leslie Paik

Administrative Burdens in the Multi-Institutional Maze

17th of March 2026

Discussant: Antonin Besch

https://www.ucpress.edu/books/trapped-in-a-maze/paper

Trapped in a Maze provides a window into families’ lived experiences in poverty by looking at their complex interactions with institutions such as welfare, hospitals, courts, housing, and schools. Families are more intertwined with institutions than ever as they struggle to maintain their eligibility for services and face the possibility that involvement with one institution could trigger other types of institutional oversight. Many poor families find themselves trapped in a multi-institutional maze, stuck in between several systems with no clear path to resolution. Tracing the complex and often unpredictable journeys of families in this maze, this book reveals how the formal rationality by which these institutions ostensibly operate undercuts what they can actually achieve. And worse, it demonstrates how involvement with multiple institutions can perpetuate the conditions of poverty that these families are fighting to escape.