How street-level bureaucrats use conceptual systems to categorise clients

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabriela Lotta ◽  
Charles Kirschbaum
Keyword(s):  
Public Schools ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
Equal Access ◽  
Access To Services ◽  
Conceptual Systems ◽  
Street Level ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Cultural Schemata ◽  
Street Level Bureaucrats ◽  
Additional Support

This study analyses how street-level bureaucrats’ categorisation of citizens is embedded within conceptual systems. We observe the process of categorisation as embedded in cultural schemata used by street-level bureaucrats. We provided vignettes to 40 teachers in São Paulo public schools to observe how they categorise similar behaviours of students within different social contexts. We then determined if there were differences in the systems of categories created and actions proposed to deal with similar behaviours in different contexts. The data showed that, depending on the way in which context triggered the teachers’ system of categorisation, distinct actions were proposed. These different actions produced different types of deservingness that, in the case analysed here, are related to actions inside or outside the school. These findings have important implications for policymakers in ensuring more equal access to services for students requiring additional support in the classroom.

The Shifting Political Winds

2016 ◽  
pp. 238-254
Author(s):  
Catherine A. Lugg ◽  
Jason P. Murphy
Keyword(s):  
Public Schools ◽  
Educational Policy ◽  
Well Being ◽  
The United States ◽  
Politics Of Education ◽  
Economic Decline ◽  
Lgbt Students ◽  
Street Level ◽  
Actual Meaning ◽  
Street Level Bureaucrats

This chapter teases out how shifting currents in US educational policy and politics vis-à-vis LGBTQ students conflict by employing a lens from the politics of education literature: street-level bureaucrats. Regardless of the intent of a policy’s authors, how street-level bureaucrats (career civil servants like public educators) define a policy through their implementation becomes the actual meaning of the policy. Given the shifting political winds regarding LGBTQ identity and educational policy, teasing out whose understandings of a given policy are actually implemented is critical for the well-being of LGBT students attending US public schools. Educators, as street-level bureaucrats, have the potential to find spaces within these broader political and policy changes to better serve as supports for LGBT students. Finally, in the United States and other locales, economic decline can amplify political discontent, including conflicts over the course and scope of educational policies.

Does Core Task Matter for Decision-Making? A Comparative Case Study on Whether Differences in Job Characteristics Affect Discretionary Street-Level Decision-Making

2015 ◽  
Vol 50 (8) ◽  
pp. 1125-1147 ◽  
Author(s):  
Didde Cramer Jensen
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Job Characteristics ◽  
Systematic Variation ◽  
Comparative Case Study ◽  
Street Level ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Street Level Bureaucrats

This article sets out to test the hypothesis that differences in fundamental job characteristics (service vs. regulation) affect discretionary street-level decision-making. The hypothesis was tested by examining whether systematic variation could be found in the moral assessments on which street-level bureaucrats performing different types of core tasks base their decisions. The issue was addressed in a comparative case study comprising three institutions, which differ systematically as far as variables of tasks are concerned. Findings showed that differences in core tasks do affect discretionary decision-making, as divergent moral assessments determine and justify decision-making across different core tasks.

scholarly journals Does religious bias shape access to public services? A large-scale audit experiment among street-level bureaucrats

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven Pfaff ◽  
Charles Crabtree ◽  
Holger L. Kern ◽  
John B. Holbein
Keyword(s):  
Public Schools ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Public Services ◽  
Religious Affiliation ◽  
The United States ◽  
Religious Groups ◽  
The Public ◽  
Street Level ◽  
Street Level Bureaucrats ◽  
To Receive

Despite growing descriptive evidence of discrimination against minority religious groups and atheists in the United States, little experimental work exists studying whether individuals face differential barriers to receiving public services depending on their religious affiliation. Here we report results from a large-scale audit study of street-level bureaucrats in the American public school system. We emailed the principals of more than 45,000 public schools and asked for a meeting, randomly assigning the religious affiliation/non-affiliation of the family. To get at potential mechanisms, we also randomly assigned belief intensity.We find evidence of substantial discrimination against Muslims and atheists. These individuals are substantially less likely to receive a response, with discrimination growing when they signal that their beliefs are more intense. Protestants and Catholics face no discrimination unless they signal that their religious beliefs are intense. Our ?findings suggest that minority religious groups and atheists face important barriers to equal representation in the public arena.

Is Empathy Required for Making Moral Judgments?

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Deigh
Keyword(s):  
Moral Judgment ◽  
Moral Judgments ◽  
Psychopathic Personality ◽  
Critical Examination ◽  
Psychological Profile ◽  
Main Thesis ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Additional Support

This essay is a study of the nature of moral judgment. Its main thesis is that moral judgment is a type of judgment defined by its content and not its psychological profile. The essay arrives at this thesis through a critical examination of Hume’s sentimentalism and the role of empathy in its account of moral judgment. The main objection to Hume’s account is its exclusion of people whom one can describe as making moral judgments though they have no motivation to act on them. Consideration of such people, particularly those with a psychopathic personality, argues for a distinction between different types of moral judgment in keeping with the essay’s main thesis. Additional support for the main thesis is then drawn from Piaget’s theory of moral judgment in children.

Policy Refiners and Street-Level Lesson Learners

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alastair Stark
Keyword(s):  
Policy Evaluation ◽  
Central Government ◽  
Street Level ◽  
Street Level Bureaucrats ◽  
Central Level ◽  
Government Level ◽  
Inquiry Lesson

This chapter explores agents who are influential in terms of inquiry lesson-learning but have not been examined before in inquiry literature. The key argument is that two types of agent—policy refiners and street-level bureaucrats—are important when it comes to the effectiveness of post-crisis lesson-learning. As they travel down from the central government level, street-level actors champion, reinterpret, and reject inquiry lessons, often because those lessons do not consider local capacities. Policy refiners, however, operate at the central level in the form of taskforces, implementation reviews, and policy evaluation processes. These refiners examine potentially problematic inquiry lessons in greater detail in order to determine whether and how they should be implemented. In doing so, these ‘mini-inquiries’ can reformulate or even abandon inquiry recommendations.

Labour Input Logic of Street-Level Bureaucrats: Evidence from Chinese Market Supervision Commission

2021 ◽  
pp. 147892992110215
Author(s):  
Chunna Li ◽  
Jun Yang
Keyword(s):  
Organizational Climate ◽  
Time Allocation ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Strong Impact ◽  
Chinese Market ◽  
Frontline Staff ◽  
Street Level ◽  
Labour Input ◽  
Street Level Bureaucrats

The theory of street-level bureaucracy and its relevant data have proven the expected duties of the frontline staff of local government may be excessive but their time spent working remains quite low. Using data from participatory observations of street-level officials in a Chinese city, this study reveals the logic of this labour input paradox. Organizational climate incentive and promotional incentive jointly influence the time allocation of street-level bureaucrats. The organizational climate incentive reflects the weak incentive characteristic of the maintenance function of labour; promotional incentives have a strong impact on motivation, which is characteristic of the promotional function of labour. These findings reveal the costs of the New Public Management movement in an organization lacking an effective promotion mechanism and a positive organizational climate incentive. This is a snapshot of the dilemma faced by China’s public organization reforms, but it is also a problem other country must solve.

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