Doctoral Dissertation Research: Homelessness and Governance in Post-Socialist Bucharest

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Stanford University Doctoral Candidate Bruce O'Neill, with the guidance of Dr. James G. Ferguson, will conduct ethnographic research on post-socialist homelessness. In many post-socialist countries, homelessness is a new phenomenon because the previous socialist states provided housing of some sort (apartments, but also orphanages and sanitoria) for all. The researcher wishes to investigate the relationship between homelessness and governance practices, urban spatial systems, and self-presentation of homeless people.The research will be conducted in homeless shelters in Bucharest, Romania, which has a growing homeless shelter population - men, women and children left out of Romania's transition to the global economy. Preliminary research revealed that shelter residents are conspicuously and self-consciously bored. The existing social science literature understands boredom as 'time idly spent,' but the researcher will investigate the possibility that boredom may be productive, a form of governance or resistance to such governance. O'Neill will investigate this phonomenon through a multi-sited ethnography comprised of three social fields using participant-observation and in-depth interviewing of key informants. The first social field is a set of shelters administered by the state and by non-governmental organizations (NGOs). The second social field focuses on public spaces, including the neighborhoods immediately surrounding homeless shelters as well as those in central Bucharest that the homeless visit to escape their boredom. The third social field includes mid-level government offices where shelter policy is administered. Findings from this research will make theoretical contributions by (1) contextualizing post-socialist homelessness; (2) investigating the heretofore neglected topic of bordeom, re-conceptualized as productive affect; (3) revealing the relationships between affect and particular spaces and places; and (4) determining how affect comes to be appropriated by various projects of governance. This research will provide a new window into the classical social science concerns about poverty, productivity, and governance in post-socialist contexts. Supporting this research also supports the education of a graduate student.