Zihals Zahlen. Geschäftszahlen als Orientierungspunkte in einer bürokratischen Welt

Doderer’s novel »Die erleuchteten Fenster« is read as a literary commentary on the use of ›small forms‹ in bureaucratic practices, the subjectivity of civil servants and the lack of a culture of responsibility in public administration. From this perspective, the profiling of the former Amtsrat Zihal appears as a reflection on the position of subjects in modern, highly developed organizations. What imprints were left by decades of bureaucratic practice, the regular reading of the Dienstpragmatik as a normative regulation of public service and the daily use of business figures to organize the official world reference? Doderer makes the shaping of personality by organizations comprehensible – as the appropriation and translation of an organization’s behavioral expectations and references to reality.