Prof. Alessandro Monsutti received a Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) grant for organizing an International Exploratory Workshop on the Bureaucratization of Utopia: International governance, audit culture and administrative subjectivities in the 21st Century on 29-30 June, 2017. The event is hosted by the Graduate Institute in collaboration with Allegra Lab.

The idea of this workshop comes from the realization of a disconnect between the progressive ideals upheld by institutions of global governance on one hand, and the rather dull nature of the bureaucratic labor that constitutes their everyday. Building upon the latest advancements in the anthropological study of bureaucracies, policy and audit cultures, this workshop examines global governance from the perspective of the actors involved in international institutional processes. It uncovers the paradoxes, potentials, and unexpected effects of specific encounters, institutional codes, norms and knowledge practices, and documentary processes. It seeks to understand the reasons for which great utopias of the past century have taken such complex bureaucratic forms--arenas for social life and political action with both constraining and enabling possibilities. 

The programme of the workshop can be accessed here.
For a full list of abstracts, please visit this link.