scholarly journals Collaborative dynamics in street level work: Working in and with communities to improve relationships and reduce deprivation

2018 ◽  
Vol 36 (7) ◽  
pp. 1319-1337 ◽  
Author(s):  
Koen PR Bartels
Keyword(s):  
Service Delivery ◽  
Power Relations ◽  
Urban Governance ◽  
Interagency Collaboration ◽  
Participatory Evaluation ◽  
Street Level ◽  
Collaborative Processes ◽  
Large Influence ◽  
Habitual Routines ◽  
Internal Relationships

Joint service delivery is a well-established aspect of urban governance but does not necessarily improve interagency collaboration or reduce socio-spatial deprivation. What happens in interactions between street level workers has a large influence on collaborative processes and outcomes but is remarkably underexplored. This article develops an understanding of the nature and impact of the relational practices enacted in street level collaboration. I argue that community-centred working can foster effective and authentic collaborative processes and, as a result, generate better societal outcomes. Based on a participatory evaluation conducted in Amsterdam, I critically appraise how working in and with communities moved collaborative dynamics in street level work away from habitual routines and power relations that sustained exclusion and inequality of local disadvantaged youngsters towards better internal relationships and less socio-spatial deprivation.

Brokerage and Boots on the Ground: Complements or Substitutes in the Manufacturing Extension Partnerships?

2018 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 288-299 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philipp Brandt ◽  
Andrew Schrank ◽  
Josh Whitford
Keyword(s):  
Optimal Design ◽  
Service Delivery ◽  
Administrative Data ◽  
Third Party ◽  
Advisory Services ◽  
Street Level ◽  
Direct Delivery ◽  
Network Failures ◽  
Street Level Bureaucrats

There is more agreement on the need for advisory services to help small and midsized manufacturers keep up with the latest managerial techniques and technologies than there is on the optimal design of those services. This study reconfigures and reanalyzes administrative data from the American Manufacturing Extension Partnership, and draws on extensive interviews with “street-level bureaucrats” at Manufacturing Extension Partnership centers, to identify and compare variation in centers’ approaches to service delivery. Centers and clients who rely on third-party providers tend to have more rather than less enduring ties, suggesting that it’s direct delivery, rather than brokerage, that is associated with one-shot deals. There is evidence also that projects generate the most impact when they help “get the relationships right” and mitigate network failures.

scholarly journals Perceptions of the Frontline Craft: Assessing Value Convergence Between Policy Makers, Managers, and Street-Level Professionals in the Prison Sector

2020 ◽  
pp. 009539972093381
Author(s):  
Hester L. Paanakker
Keyword(s):  
Service Delivery ◽  
Public Service ◽  
Shared Values ◽  
Prison Inmates ◽  
Public Officials ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Value Differences ◽  
Organizational Conditions ◽  
Street Level ◽  
Socialization Processes

From the unique perspective of perceptions of the frontline craft, this study examines value convergence between policy makers, managers, and street-level professionals ( N = 55). Toxic stereotyping between staff levels, exacerbated by restrictive organizational conditions, are shown to overshadow positive value convergence from socialization processes. In this Dutch prison study, public officials are consistently biased to believe that the management above them prioritizes targets (values that support the organization) over content (values that serve prison inmates). This explains how perceived role and value differences impact the actualization of shared values in public service delivery much more negatively than the actual differences.

scholarly journals Evaluating projects in multifaceted and marginalised communities: The need for mixed approaches

2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 22-38 ◽  
Author(s):  
Liz Curran ◽  
Pamela Taylor-Barnett
Keyword(s):  
Young People ◽  
Service Delivery ◽  
Evaluation Process ◽  
Participatory Evaluation ◽  
Evaluation Framework ◽  
Legal Services ◽  
Community Agencies ◽  
Critical Elements ◽  
Complex Settings ◽  
Justice Practice

This article examines the evaluation process and approach undertaken for a recent 3-year Integrated Justice Practice project. Three key approaches underpinned the evaluation framework or program logic: participatory evaluation, action research, and continuous reflective practice. The project involved an evaluation of community agencies working in complex settings, within a human service delivery context. The mix of processes encouraged these agencies to own the evaluation through providing clarity and grounded information about what works, how, and what does not work and why, so as to improve both service delivery and community understanding, and to affect policy and funding settings. The discussion is situated within several theories of ‘participatory evaluation’ – meaning that the views of service receivers and providers were included both in the research and in its design. These perspectives were essential because input from young people about how legal services support them, and from providers about the policies services adopt is rare. The services and their partners reported that the evaluation process had been ‘transformative’, with each identifying changes in practice. It’s also edifying for the evaluators, revealing that cultural competency, trust, respect and safety are critical elements when engaging with young people with unresolved legal issues, including family violence.

scholarly journals Dealing With Questions of Responsiveness in a Low-Discretion Context: Offers of Assistance in Standardized Public Service Encounters

2020 ◽  
Vol 52 (9) ◽  
pp. 1333-1361
Author(s):  
Elin Thunman ◽  
Mats Ekström ◽  
Anders Bruhn
Keyword(s):  
Service Delivery ◽  
Real Time ◽  
Communication Technology ◽  
Public Service ◽  
Social Insurance ◽  
Information Communication Technology ◽  
Service Encounters ◽  
Information Communication ◽  
Street Level ◽  
Competing Demands

A key theme in the research on bureaucratic encounters pertains to street-level bureaucrats’ opportunities for responsiveness when discretion is constrained by the introduction of standardized service delivery regulations, such as information communication technology (ICT). This article contributes to existing scholarship by exploring how low-discretion officials at the Swedish Social Insurance Agency Customer Center manage competing demands of making decisions that are built on regulations and simultaneously responding to the situation at hand and individuals’ needs. Analyzing real-time interactions using the conversation analytical concept of “offers of assistance” enables us to discover new aspects of interactional practices of responsiveness in standardized service encounters.

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