This article uses work and state relations at a Nepali electricity office as a staging ground for bringing the labour of repair squarely into focus in the ethnography of infrastructure. A trio of electricians at the office had a torrid time trying to address an ever-increasing number of complaints. Customers were under the impression that the electricians were both lazy and slow, despite even compromising safety regulations to get more work done. Although the electricians’ jobs may be comparatively stable and privileged, they put their bodies on the line to service an often-unappreciative public. This shows that infrastructures are made of people, not simply constructed by them. This is often skirted over in the anthropology of infrastructure, which frames repair through its absence and insufficiency, in rare ethnographic engagements with those who do repair work. A suggested response to this deficiency is found in a social reproduction theory of infrastructure.

本文以尼泊尔电力办公室的工作和国家关系为舞台，将维修工作直接纳入基础设施民族志的焦点。办公室的三名电工在试图解决越来越多的投诉时度过了一段艰难的时光。客户的印象是电工既懒惰又慢，尽管他们甚至为了完成更多工作而牺牲了安全规定。尽管电工的工作可能相对稳定且享有特权，但他们冒着生命危险为通常不受欢迎的公众服务。这表明基础设施是由人构成的，而不仅仅是由他们。这在基础设施的人类学中经常被绕过，在与从事维修工作的人进行罕见的民族志接触时，基础设施的缺失和不足构成了维修的框架。在基础设施的社会再生产理论中发现了对这一缺陷的建议回应。