Nathalie Montel is co-organizing with Isabelle Backouche (EHESS, CRH) a study day on the theme of "Urban Complaints" on Tuesday, October 15, 2019, at EHESS (Paris).
This transdisciplinary study day aims to focus attention on written complaints from city dwellers about their city. Mostly handwritten, these letters of complaint belong to the repertoire of protest and the large family of letters addressed to the authorities. What do these quiet complaints tell us, in the different contexts in which they are expressed, about the relationships between city dwellers and those who govern them, but also about urban lifestyles, daily life, and social interactions in the city? What forms do these written complaints take, and what strategies do complainants use to win their cases? Are intermediaries called upon to write these complaints? How do the authorities choose to respond to these grievances, which require them to take action? Do these complaints from ordinary city dwellers and individual initiatives have the power to influence the policies put in place or to change certain practices of the urban authorities?