Producing Kartinka: Street-Level Bureaucracy and Implementation of Russia’s Tolerance Policy in St. Petersburg

Abstract

In 2006, a “tolerance policy” was launched in St. Petersburg to address the growing xenophobia and the need to integrate labor migrants. Applying a bottom–up perspective, this study finds that this policy was symbolic – aimed at changing public attitudes, not at providing material outcomes. The direct implementers (the street-level bureaucracy), operating under governmental constraints, drew on informal mechanisms: behind-the-scenes negotiations, unwritten rules and hierarchies, personalist power, and ideological cues. Formalized dense reporting, often quantitative, was used to keep low-level implementers in check. The combination of these features rendered the tolerance policy shallow and self-locked. Street-level bureaucracy had to interpret vague policy documents, but lacked the necessary discretionary powers. This gave rise to the kartinka (picture, or image) coping technique. The term describes how all work activities were shaped by the need to demonstrate progress with respect to unwritten rules and ideological dynamics. The article concludes with a discussion of the applicability of the author’s findings to the field of nationalities policy in Russia.