Shows
Under The Table: An Anthropology of Corruption PodcastAudit Culture and Dirty Elites: A Talk with Cris Shore (9/10/2024)Sylvia and Aaron chat with Cris Shore (Professor of Social Anthropology at Goldsmiths) about his work on corruption in the European Union. We talk about the EU's "parallel system of administration," methodologies for studying that which should not be seen, the trouble defining corruption, the weaponization of anti-corruption laws, university/academic corruption, the rise of "audit culture," and "shit swimming" (a surfers' campaign against corruption in sewage management), and legalized corruption in Britain. Some of Cris Shore's Publications2024. Compliance, Defiance, and ‘Dirty’ Luxury: New Perspectives on Anti-Corruption in Elite Contexts. Edited by Tereza Østbø Kuld...2024-10-211h 28Under The Table: An Anthropology of Corruption Podcast"Transparency and Anti-Corruption in India, a chat with Anu (Aradhana) Sharma" (1/19/2024)Sylvia and Aaron chat with Anu Sharma about her work on corruption and good governance in India, including that country's "Right to Know" movement and related Transparency of Information legislation. We discuss the relationship between anti-corruption legislation and women’s development and empowerment in India. We discuss the category of “techno-moral assemblage” key to Anu's oeuvre and the related limitation of liberal models of corruption. We talk about the Left-Right valence of Indian anti-corruption discourse and how anti-corruption efforts in India shift their institutional frame from NGO to social movement to political party-- often to overcome government resistance to real an...2024-02-211h 02Under The Table: An Anthropology of Corruption PodcastAlan Smart on Corruption and Informality in Hong Kong (11/1/23)Sylvia and Aaron interview Alan Smart about his research on Chinese practices of gift-mediated friendship (guanxi) and the role of guanxi relations in capitalist ventures. Guanxi is increasingly viewed as a form of corruption but it remains important to the success of new commerce. This leads us to discuss the role of informality in general and specifically in Hong Kong's contested squatter settlements, which is the subject of Alan's most recent book. Alan leaves us with some useful guanxi-inspired advice for academic success, which might be particularly interesting for our junior academic listeners. (Very) Selected ReferencesBooks2023-11-011h 11Under The Table: An Anthropology of Corruption PodcastPonzi Schemes in Post-Socialist Albania, a chat with Smoki Musaraj (7/23/2023)Sylvia and Aaron chat with Dr. Smoki Musaraj about her book, Tales from Albarado: Ponzi Logics of Accumulation in Postsocialist Albania (Cornell University Press, 2020). We discuss the forms of corruption (and corruption allegations) that arose during Albania's rapid transition from an insular command economy to a neoliberal capitalist economy. Smoki takes us through her work on ponzi schemes, satyrical anti-corruption television, kin-focused remittences from Albanians working abroad, and the use of corruption allegations for partisan ends. Below are some of Smoki Musaraj's recent works: Smoki Musaraj and Nataša Gregoriç Bon. 2021. “Introduc...2023-08-151h 02Under The Table: An Anthropology of Corruption PodcastBribes, Foxes, and Moral Legitimacy-- a talk with Italo PardoAaron and Sylvia talk with Italo Pardo about the importance of empirically-grounded anthropological studies of corruption. As one of the earliest anthropologists committed to the explicit study of corruption, Italo draws on his work in both Italy and the UK to illustrate his attention to the interplay between legality, legitimacy, and morality. Of particular interest to Italo are those instances of corruption or abuses of power that do not technically break the law, but that do break citizens’ trust. Such legal yet illegitimate forms of corruption are especially insidious as they enjoy the credentials of legality and therefore cannot be pun...2023-05-1044 minUnder The Table: An Anthropology of Corruption PodcastThe Outrageous Comparisons of Michael HerzfeldSylvia and Aaron interview Professor Michael Herzfeld about his latest book, Subversive Archaism: Troubling Traditionalists and the Politics of National Heritage. Durham: Duke University Press, 2022 . We begin with Dr. Herzfeld's penchant for comparing seemingly disparate cultural settings, settings that, as he argues, share parallel histories of "crypto-colonialism." To take his latest example, we discuss how mountain dwellers in Greece and urbanites in Bangkok make similar subversive claims against their states by positioning themselves as the authentic protagonists of their nations' celebrated traditions. We fit this discussion into Dr. Herzfeld's larger body of work, especially his arguments about t...2023-03-201h 10Under The Table: An Anthropology of Corruption PodcastGetting Our Goat with Kregg Hetherington (9/16/2022)Sylvia and Aaron talk to Kregg about soy bean cultivation in Paraguay and the role of corruption and anti-corruption measures in rural land struggles. We discuss the encroachment of mechanized soy production into subsistence farming, the link between soy cultivation, democracy and anti-corruption, and the effects of anti-corruption measures on campesinos (peasants) who pursue land claims in Paraguay's courts. Kregg also reflects on the ethics of patron-client relationships (a species of the corruption genus) and the depiction of these "clientelist" relationships in ethnographic writing. Here are some of Kregg's books:2020 The Government of Beans: Regula...2022-09-161h 16Under The Table: An Anthropology of Corruption PodcastEthics or the Right Thing? Aaron Interviews Sylvia Tidey on her new book (08/19/2022)Sylvia and I discuss her book, Ethics or the Right Thing?: Corruption and Care in the Age of Good Governance University of Chicago Press, 2022 (Distributed for HAU). Sylvia tells us how state officials in one Indonesian province found themselves caught between Western models of governmental impartiality ("the right thing") and familial models of reciprocity and mutual care ("ethics"). Sometimes these officials are able to satisfy both norms at once, but sometimes not. We discuss Indonesian anti-corruption projects that target practices of nepotism, the circumstances in which officials enjoy the discretion to favor those in their exte...2022-08-201h 16Under The Table: An Anthropology of Corruption PodcastNigeria's 419: an Interview with Daniel Jordan Smith (3/18/22)In the second episode of the podcast series, we interview Dr. Daniel Jordan Smith, Professor of Anthropology at Brown University as well as the Charles C. Tillinghast, Jr. Professor ofInternational Studies. Dan is the author of a landmark ethnography of corruption, A Cultureof Corruption: Everyday Deception and Popular Discontent in Nigeria (2007). We discuss this book as well as his latest Every Household Its Own Government: Improvised Infrastructure, Entrepreneurial Citizens, and the State in Nigeria (2022). Dan explains how Nigerians understand corruption, its place in their national culture, and Nigerians' efforts to fight it. As Dan makes i...2022-03-181h 01Under The Table: An Anthropology of Corruption PodcastThe Left Hand of Sarah Muir: Corruption and Crisis in Argentina (10/14/2021)In our inaugural episode, we talk with Dr. Sarah Muir of the The City College of New York and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York (CUNY). Sarah is a cultural and linguistic anthropologist specializing in Argentina and a long-time advocate for a systematic, anthropological study of corruption. During the podcast, we discuss Sarah’s recent book Routine Crisis: An Ethnography of Disillusion (2021) that explores how ordinary Argentines talk about and diagnose the problem of corruption in their society, especially amidst the 2001-2002 financial crisis. We learn that talk of corruption as a language for understanding eve...2021-10-1459 min