Quite an experience: Using ethnography to study local governance

Ethnographic fieldwork brings something special to the study of sense‐making in local governance: the ethnographer's access to the experiences lived by the people under study. In addition, ethnographers not only look for the experiences of the people in and around local government, they also draw on their own experiences. Because the experiences of politicians, administrators, bureaucrats, professionals and citizens are both the result of and the basis for their acts, understanding these experiences helps ethnographers to explain the practice of local governance. This paper sketches the background of interpretive ethnography, gives an idea of the use of ethnographic fieldwork in recent research, and explains the idea behind fieldwork. It also discusses the elements of fieldwork. In particular, the paper looks at the usefulness of ethnographic fieldwork for the study of local governance.