Going inside the bank

by Nicole Findlay

As a researcher, Graham Smart of SLALS has straddled the fine line between insider and observer to examine the role of writing in the inner workings of the Bank of Canada, the country’s central bank. A former employee of the bank, Smart tackled his subject from an anthropological perspective, using an ethnographic approach to delve into the cultural practices of the economists who direct the nation’s monetary policy.

His research focused on how writing -in combination with computer-run economic models and other technologies- contributes to “knowledge-building, policy-making, and external communications.”

“As a central bank, the Bank of Canada is really a large research and policy institute, and a very writing-intensive organization,” said Smart. For example, each quarter a group of the institution’s staff economists spend a month collaborating to produce the White Book, a document used by senior management to inform and guide their policy decisions-decisions that have a direct influence on Canada’s economy.

Prior to embarking on an academic career, first in the U.S. and in SLALS since 2004, Smart spent 15 years at the Bank of Canada working as an in-house writing consultant and trainer. “It was my status as a Bank ‘insider’ that allowed me, over time, to gain insights about the economists’ writing and intellectual collaboration that I couldn’t have otherwise obtained,” said Smart.

To strive for balance and to counter his close association with his research subjects in the bank, Smart interviewed ten outside economists, several of whom he approached because he knew them to be critical of the Bank’s monetary policy.

Smart has recently published the results of his ethnographic study in his book Writing the Economy: Activity, Genre and Technology in the World of Banking.