Prisoners and escapees: Improving the institutional responsibility square in Bangladesh

The article argues that explanations of problematic governance are institut ional rather than organizational and have their roots in the deep structure s of society. Bangladesh is used as an exemplar for such analysis, deployin g the notion of the institutional responsibility square comprising four ins titutional domains of state, market, community and household. A prison or ' total institution' metaphor is used to describe the ways in which different classes are obliged to pursue their livelihoods, entrapped within the prob lematic social embeddedness of these four institutional domains. The articl e develops this argument via three themes: permeability between these domai ns (i.e., blurred moral boundaries between public and private behaviour); p roblem of legitimation of public institutions, given this permeability; and the incorporated rather than independent characteristics of civil society, thus limiting optimism about its potential to create reform. Nevertheless the article offers a strategic agenda of institutional improvement (i.e., e scape from the prison) based on the principles of shifting people's rights fi-om the problematic, uncertain informal sphere towards the formal realm. Copyright (C) 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.