Forms of government and complementarity between state administration and its administrated: Reflexions on a service for men who commit domestic violence

Abstract

This article reflects on how certain forms of government are (re)elaborated through the performance of a “service” aimed at “men who commit domestic violence. The material is ethnographically elaborated and is based on my insertion as a researcher in an administrative instance in the Baixada Fluminense of Rio de Janeiro. In this sense, it is an investigation about State formation processes, emphasizing the practices, dynamics and interactions established on a daily basis by administrators - “the technicians” - and administrated - “the men” -, as well as between different instances and state devices. The article attempts to understand the continuous production of the State “in action”, privileging the dynamics that constitute the administration’s ways of doing, as well as the modes of subjectification that are operationalized by the subjects attended at this ethnographic instance. To do that, it considers a series of constraints conducted by the specific forms of management the subjects are exposed to.