Throughout the colonial period, Algerian users are largely absent from the administrative archives of the Postal, Telegraph, and Telephone Service (PTT). If the French conquest did not spur colonized populations, with their ancient writing practices, to “enter into communication,” should this absence be understood as the refusal of a progress that was itself colonialist? The period between the two world wars marked a turning point: pressure from local representatives and a wave of petitions from noncitizen (Algerian) villagers reconfigured a public service previously monopolized by European users. Belatedly, and with as little expense as possible, the administration finally supported postal services for isolated areas.

Observing the colonial configuration in the most situated and ordinary of its manifestations, this article sheds light on everyday writing practices and reinstates the “thickness” of a local service. Rather than limiting the study to the French presence in Algeria, this depends on pressing the colonial documentation to reveal the workings of Algerian society and the reorganizations prompted by the colonial encounter. Complaints and petitions thus illuminate the relation of noncitizen, rural, and mostly illiterate populations to the colonial state. The unexpected utilization of the postal service and subversive demands for access to it led colonized populations to piece together a political identity that borrowed certain practices from active citizens and drove the French authorities to propose unprecedented adjustments.

This article investigates the creation, in 1924, of a new offence in French law, aimed at punishing anyone found guilty of “breaching the credit of the state”—that is, of discourses or practices likely to damage the financial reputation of the French state. In the midst of a destabilizing budgetary and monetary crisis, surrounded by fierce political disputes, “the credit of the state” was legally defined as an essential attribute of sovereignty, to be defended against internal and external threats. However, the intellectual history of public credit and the analysis of archival material relating to this new offence show how difficult it was for courts to draw a line between the freedom of the market and the protection of public order. More broadly, this research emphasizes the interconnected role of material and immaterial elements in promoting public trust in the value of the papers (bonds and currency) issued by the state.

This article is an attempt to show the originality of Pierre-Michel Menger's sociological work through the study of his theoretical trajectory. A useful starting point can be found at the fruitful intersection between the analysis of professions and the justification of public policies. For instance, contemporary serious music depends on public subsidies even though there is as yet no public demand for it. The actors involved must make decisions about the future in an uncertain world, a theme that serves as the guiding thread of Menger's major book, Le travail créateur. How should sociology consider the uncertainty that rules inter-individual adjustments? That is the task that an innovative social science must undertake. Menger does not import economic reasoning into his sociology, but confronts these approaches while maintaining a critical tension between them, a position that sets him apart from the partisans of rational choice theory. Menger's research program is ambitious, but two questions remain: What is the status of history within the model under construction? And how can we obtain a clearer vision of the concept of talent, which often remains a black box?

Drawing on research conducted in Russian and Ukrainian archives, this article explores the legal profession in the late Stalin-era USSR, with a focus on the years following the Second World War. During this period, the number of cases dealt with in the courts grew considerably, and calls to rehabilitate “socialist legality” became more pressing. It is against this backdrop that the article details the different professional aspects—social trajectories and daily practices—of the criminal lawyer's craft. It concludes that while their influence remained relatively weak and was rarely anchored in their legal capabilities, Soviet lawyers did develop economic and networking capacities that enabled them to maintain their autonomy and to fully participate in the dynamics of the Soviet society that emerged in the aftermath of the war. Despite their weak position and the purges they had suffered, lawyers found ways to gain privileged information about ongoing cases, and some of them played an intermediary role between the apparatus of repression and Soviet notables—particularly by participating in the system of bribery and clientelism. Their actions exemplified the ways that Soviets acclimatized to Stalin's dictatorship, working to bend and improve the rules and to create spaces of protection, mutual assistance, and exchange at the heart of the state and the party.