Governing Street-Level Bureaucracies

Kerstin Jacobsson is a Professor of sociology at the Department of Sociology and Work Science at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden. She has published extensively on discourse and governance in the field of social and labour market policy, as well as on street-level bureaucracy.Håkan Johansson is a Professor of social work at the School of Social Work at Lund University, Sweden. He has published extensively on topics related to comparative social policy and activation reforms and their implementation in Nordic welfare states.

“Governing Street Level Bureaucracies provides a uniquely rich insight into the complex and dynamic realities of two major welfare bureaucracies. Using a multi-method approach and inspired by street-level bureaucracy and critical management theory and studies, the book offers an important contribution to our understanding of the work practices and their management in these welfare state institutions. I fully endorse the authors’ claim that the book’s relevance goes beyond the Swedish context in which the study took place.”Rik van Berkel, Faculty of Law, Economics and Governance, School of Governance (USG), Utrecht University

• 1. Introduction: Governing Street-Level Bureaucracies 2. Normative Governance in Street-Level Bureaucracies 3. The Organizational Context 4. Governance by Discourse 5. Governance by Emotion 6. Governance by Peers 7. Governance by Numbers, Colours, and Symbols 8. Caseworker Subjectivities and Responses to Governance 9. Conclusion