Når beskæftigelsen rykker ud: Et frontlinjeperspektiv på at balancere forskellige normative værdier, når det ene ben er placeret inde i Jobcentret og det andet ben er ude i den boligsociale Helhedsplan

Abstract

The thesis investigates how frontline workers in a Danish Job Center experiences and handles moving the employment-oriented work into a Comprehensive Social Housing Plan via a so-called Forward Employment Effort. The frontline workers in the thesis thus represents the Job Center and the employment discourse but must also be part of the collaboration locally in the Comprehensive Social Housing Plan close to the citizen. This means that the frontline worker must navigate in two different frameworks, which have different normative expectations, but the task is the same: getting the citizen into employment or education. The thesis has its scientific theoretical basis in hermeneutics, which forms the framework for the methodological approach and the angle of the research field. It is a qualitative case study carried out in Aalborg Municipality, and to collect empirical data, the qualitative research method is used. To outline the Job Centers and the Comprehensive Social Housing Plan’s framework, an analysis of central authoritative documents combined with two exploratory semi-structured interviews of two leading representatives for each area was conducted. The case study is further based on four semi-structured interviews with the frontline workers, who constitute the Forward Employment Effort. The thesis predominantly has a deductive approach, where the theory from the start has played a significant role. The theoretical basis springs from the street-level bureaucracy theories with an onset of primarily Bernardo Zacka’s perspectives and concepts to illuminate the frontline workers’ role and understanding of responsibility. Through this, the frontline workers’ challenge of balancing four central normative values concerning: efficiency, justice, responsiveness, and respect are clarified. The focus is on their margin of discretion, where the possibility of varied moral weighting arises. To highlight how the frontline workers in a more conscious and strategic way can take on their role, Bernado Zacka’s abstract theoretical perspectives are supplemented with parts of Erving Goffman’s more concrete theater metaphors. The focus of the thesis is initially to investigate how the two different frameworks either promote or inhibit the normative values. This is to subsequently illuminate how the frontline workers in the effort experience the two normative worlds and how they handle their role, including how they develop moral dispositions tied to their ideal values. Finally, the thesis looks at how the frontline workers strategically put on masks that fit their ideal image and how the physical setting matters to either support or counteract their ideal role. The conclusion and findings of the thesis indicate that in the Forward Employment Effort, a fusion between two different normative worlds takes place. With the Job Center’s employment perspective, more “hard” normative values - such as efficiency and evidence are weighted, and out in the Comprehensive Social Plan, more “soft” values - such as responsiveness, meaningfulness, and respect are weighted. The two sets of values are reflected in the different physical settings, each of which underpins their normative weighting. The frontline worker must therefore balance between the two different normative frameworks in their role. The thesis concludes that the frontline workers, in various ways, experience how “moving employment out” can both give rise to continuing the same work as in the Job Center, but it also creates a larger margin of discretion, which to a greater extent allows for the realization of soft ideal values. It is also in the discretion that the frontline worker has the opportunity to handle their role by putting on a consciously strategic mask. The thesis concludes that it can be problematic if the values tip too much to either side in the organization or the frontline worker, as it can create a basis for the development of reducing pathological moral dispositions.

A master thesis from Aalborg University

Når beskæftigelsen rykker ud: Et frontlinjeperspektiv på at balancere forskellige normative værdier, når det ene ben er placeret inde i Jobcentret og det andet ben er ude i den boligsociale Helhedsplan

[When the Employment Effort moves out: A frontline perspective on balancing different normative values, with one foot placed inside the Job Centre and the other foot in the Comprehensive Social Housing Plan]