Negotiated criminality: practices, peoples, and organizations in illegalized economies
April 25 2023
Organizing committee:
Guillaume Dumont, Emlyon Business School, France.
Louis Vuilleumier, University of Fribourg, Switzerland.
Loïc Pignolo, University of Geneva, Switzerland.
Theme
Illegalized economies are a global phenomenon. While they enable some individuals in extremely precarious conditions to make a living or acquire illegalized goods and services, they also represent huge profit opportunities for both criminal and non-criminal organizations. Additionally, illegalized economies raise moral controversies and lead to considerable policing efforts at the local and international levels. Furthermore, the activities at the core of these economies take place within rural and urban communities, where attitudes towards illegality can range from tolerance and support to indignation and contestation. In other words, illegalized economies are embedded in complex and multi-layered contexts shaping how individuals and organizations navigate everyday life.
Ethnographers have long been on the front line in the study of the practices, people, and organizations constitutive of these illegalized economies (Becker, 1973; Ferrell & Hamm, 1998; Koonings et al., 2019; Parnell & Kane, 2003). Their commitment to prolonged presence has proven key for accessing hidden populations and practices, and their involvement in multiple aspects of the everyday life of these populations is crucial to building trust and collecting in-depth data (e.g., Adler, 1993; Bourgois, 2003). These aspects make ethnography uniquely suited to seeing beyond the oversimplified and distant views on illegalized economies. Additionally, the unique nature of the activities under study (often framed as violent, illegal, criminal, immoral) shapes how ethnographers write about their field (e.g. Boeri & Shukla, 2019; Jones & Rodgers, 2019).
Purpose and format
The purpose of this PDW is to provide ethnographers at different stages of their fieldwork with guidance and expertise in the development of their manuscripts before submission. Senior scholars will help participants to (1) think about novel ways to use their ethnographic data in the construction of a compelling narrative for their paper and (2) develop a theoretical contribution building on this data. This PDW is structured as a one-day workshop with a highly interactive format, in which each author will be provided 10 minutes to present the paper and 35 minutes for collective discussion. Each paper will be reviewed in-depth by one senior scholar, who will provide practical and developmental written feedback aimed at strengthening and improving each author’s work. All authors must commit to reading two selected papers of other participants and providing additional feedback.
Final program
Introduction Guillaume Dumont/Loïc Pignolo/Louis Vuilleumier.
Building a positive sense of self in a morally ambivalent market.
The case of the street-level cannabis market in Geneva
Speaker: Loïc Pignolo (Geneva Uni.)
Discutants: David Courpasson (Emlyon) and Mar Perezts (Emlyon)
Being a socially included woman who use and sell drugs. A comparison between Bordeaux and Montréal. Speaker: Sarah Perrin (ISPED)
Discutants: Dennis Giordano (Emlyon) and Mar Perezts (Emlyon)
Researching illegalized economies. Potentials, limits and challenges of ethnographic work in the Port of Santos, Brazil. Speaker: Isabela Vianna Pinho (UFSCAR)
Discutants: Dennis Rodgers (IHEID) and Guillaume Dumont (Emlyon)
Mother’s spatial dispossession and negotiations at the urban margins of Marseille: towards a spatial approach to intersectionality
Speaker: Alice Daquin (IHEID)
Discutants: David Courpasson (Emlyon) and Gabriel Feltran (Sciences Po)
Another life, maybe?
Speaker: Elena Butti (IHEID & UCL)
Discutants: Matias Dewey (St. Gallen Uni.) and Meropi Tzanetakis (Manchester Uni.)
Negotiated illegalization, performed deservingness. Migrants drug workers navigating police scrutiny.
Speaker: Louis Vuilleumier (Fribourg Uni.)
Discutants: Dennis Rodgers (IHEID) and Gabriel Feltran (Sciences Po)
Negotiating drug exchanges on cryptomarkets
Speaker: Meropi Tzanetakis (Manchester Uni.)
Discutants: Dennis Giordano (Emlyon) and Matias Dewey (St. Gallen Uni.)