Cercles citoyens et espace public : la démocratisation organisationnelle à l’épreuve des rodas brésiliennes

In Brazil, anti-authoritarian movements, particularly those engaged in psychiatric reform, are creating some of the newest innovative democratic forms of social participation. The aim of this research is first to understand how these new participatory schema act on the social relations of power across the mental health network in the city of Campinas in the State of São Paulo. I first problematize the social and economic forces involved in the construction of this network and its "system of analysis and co-management". This participatory model of organization requires users, workers, managers and sometimes local elected officials work side by side. Across the different streams of organizational sociology, the user is seen to play a central role in defining the socio-political dimension of the organization. However this is not achieved through participatory schema rather the user arises from the production of political subjectivation and the actual experiments themselves. Using ethnographic data collected during an eight-month period from across the Campinas mental health network, I observe how the transformation of the subjective social relations of power experienced by the actors refers to specific collective configurations commonly known as "rodas" (Circle in Portuguese). The term “rodas” refers to small groups of actors who meet to reflect, debate and decide on actions to be taken in relation to mental health practices in the city. These collective configurations allow citizens to give meaning and form to a local democratization project. The study then focuses on how the rodas influence the social relations of power induced by the local organization. In 2012, the Campinas mental health network went through one of the biggest crises in its history. Cuts and the privatization of services led to widespread citizen mobilization. In this context, I identify tensions and strategies within the rodas and their means for participation across the network paying attention to their everyday experiences. The analysis of rodas opens up new avenues of understanding the levers of collective power in an organizational context. Through the sharing of time in a plurality of open spaces, through sharing affect as well as through collective problem-solving of critical events impacting affecting daily life, the rodas act to reduce organisational e hierarchy. This collective effort of constantly renew democratization does not however make it possible to overcome the inequalities of power induced by the organization of services and by Brazilian society. As a form of citizen participatory practice, rodas nevertheless provide collective levers that denounce contradictions and social injustices within and outside the organization. Their practices highlight the possibility of a continuous collective criticism open to social creativity. This research opens a new field of study on citizen participation and innovation in the context of the organization; a field that is all the more promising because it is part of a critical renewal of the sociology of organizations.

Keyphrases: Organisation, Organization, Democratization, Social power relations, Citizen practice, Participation schema, Mental health network services, Social state, Brazil