Person, Agency and State: investigation routines in Argentinean federal legal cases

Abstract

The subject of this article is a Juzgado Federal de Instrucción, where federal crimes are investigated in the city of Posadas (Misiones state, Argentina). I've described, by trying to write from a native perspective, the routines, people, roles, action, evidences, anecdotes, movements, and memories, basically everything that is a part of this environment and that functions as a referential of possibilities. Distinctions between the three powers are realized through the flows and continuities that actually make these divisions impossible to perceive (perhaps because they neither always exist nor do they exist everywhere). I explore a variety of situations and aspects all of which are part of the instrucción , as parts of the decision-making processes, emphasizing the constant creativity that people use and which ends up provoking a chain reaction, escaping the official competence of this authority, yet, at the same time, permitting it to function.