The ruler and the protractor.

Summary Health scandals, police violence, environmental pollution, breaches of the labor code, evaluation of public policy... all of these issues are the subject of mobilization by inspection services. The fact that they are regularly convened does not exempt them from criticism: if they were fussy, they would impede the smooth running of the economy; if they were disconnected from the field, they would embody a bureaucratic power that was deaf to claims; if they were subject to the authority of a supervisory body, they would deliberately "whitewash" wrongdoing by the inspected. The contributions gathered in this book show that inspection services do not only have a name in common but that their activity makes them intermediaries between inspected persons and principals. Inspecting is as much about shedding light on the course and causes of certain crises as it is about controlling, in a more routine manner, the conformity of the practices of actors and private individuals with a set of regulations and rules. The inspector is not only the one who verifies that the inspected apply the rule, he is also the reporter of what they have given him to see.