Conference Agenda

Street-level bureaucracy research is traditionally approached from the perspective of street-level bureaucrats, examining how individual coping behaviors, collective work practices and street-level management shape public encounters and policy-as-delivered. In recent years, more attention has been given to citizens as equally important parts of the equation. Research on co-creation of public services, notions such as relational public administration, and the growing literature on administrative burdens highlights how differences in social capital, administrative literacy, strategic agency, and emotions such as anger or uncertainty may influence encounters with the state. In this paper, we discuss how street-level bureaucracy research might benefit from further expanding current views on citizens/clients in public encounters. We begin by presenting an overview of established and emergent lines of inquiry. Based on this, we highlight two perspectives that are currently underdeveloped but, in our view, carry significant potential in terms of advancing the field through a deeper engagement with the notions of “client” and “citizen”, respectively.

First, we discuss the potential of engaging more actively with the notion of the “client”. This implies a perspective that highlights the citizen as a recipient of professional services and hence as an object of professional inquiry and problem-solving. Notably, street-level scholars have long recognized that many street-level bureaucrats are also professionals; however, this rarely entails a deeper engagement with the processes through which citizens are actively constructed as professional problems. What do citizens become and what can, is or should be expected from them when viewed through the lens of a particular professional practice, be it social work, health care, teaching, or policing? To advance this line of inquiry, we call for a stronger integration between street-level scholarship and scholarship in relevant professional fields such as social work, policing, or health care research.

Second, drawing on John Dewey's notion of citizenship as a public office, we discuss the potential of engaging more actively with the notion of the “citizen”. Dewey saw democracy as an ongoing participatory process where individuals actively shape collective life by taking on public roles and learning to act in the public interest rather than based on private preferences. In this view, citizens should not be seen as passive recipients of bureaucratic action but potential co-creators of public policy and services, responsible for engaging in governance through informed decision-making, participation, and self-regulation. Applying this lens to street-level bureaucracy, we can explore how citizens, by for instance managing their own health, complying with or challenging policies, and engaging in civic life, influence the delivery and legitimacy of public services.

We conclude the paper by emphasizing the need for a deeper engagement with and integration of both client and citizen perspectives in street-level bureaucracy research and practice. Recognizing varying capacities for engagement, bureaucrats and policies must differentiate between those who can participate and those who require advocacy, support, or protection. This challenges simplistic notions of citizen responsibility and calls for a balanced approach—one that fosters civic engagement while ensuring equitable service delivery and professional responsibility for those in vulnerable positions.

This paper empirically explores how we can conceptualise the quality of interaction in the public encounter. During public encounters, where state representatives and citizens interact, policy is implemented and public services are delivered, (Goodsell, 1981). We argue that a high quality of interaction is required for successful public service delivery as this facilitates, among many other things, the necessary information sharing between frontline professionals and citizen-client. Frontline-professionals depend on these high-quality interactions to responsively deliver public services to reach policy goals (Heinrich, 2015). For citizen-clients high quality public encounters are a way to access the public services which can increase their quality of living and trust in government (Vigoda-Gadot, 2007). Despite their importance for public service delivery, the interactional dynamics of public encounters remain underexplored in public administration research, with no conceptual framework that considers its dyadic quality. Prior studies predominantly focus on the behaviours or experience from either the perspective of the citizen or the frontline professional (e.g. Nielsen, et al., 2021; Zacka, 2017; Tummers, et al., 2015) (notable exceptions being Döring, et al., 2024 and Mik-Meyer & Haugaard, 2021). This is problematic since the we argue that the interaction between frontline professionals and citizen-clients is a social and dyadic phenomenon, and that the quality of the public encounter should be more than the sum of its parts.

This paper sets out to answer the following question: How can the dyadic quality of interaction in public encounters be conceptualised in the context of public service delivery?

This paper takes an interdisciplinary approach by bridging literatures of public administration and social psychology. We use an abductive, qualitative design. We first introduce four synthesising concepts – rapport, mutual trust, psychological safety, and feeling heard – that inform the theoretical background of this paper. These concepts reflect the mutual influence that the frontline professional and the citizen-client have on one another and on the quality and outcome of the encounter (Brauer & Proyer, 2019). Second, we outline the characteristics of public encounters and classify them based on their people-processing versus people-changing functions. We consider and systematically examine these variations since contexts can shape the meaning and relevance of concepts (Johns, 2006) and actors in the public encounter may behave differently, depending on the type of the encounter (Hasenfeld, 1972). Thirdly, we empirically explore the research question by selecting two organisations that provide people-processing and people-changing encounters. We diversify the contexts of the study so that, if common patterns emerge, we strengthen our argument for the core characteristics of the quality of interaction (Weiss, 1994). Our sample will consist of frontline professional and citizen-client couples (N≈24?). We increase the validity of the data by first observing different types of public encounters to later contextualise the interview data. The observation is followed by semi-structured interviews with each actor respectively, which nests the data in the dyad and allows us to conceptualise the quality of interaction on a dyadic level.

Unemployment is both a collective problem and an individual risk. Imperfect labour markets fail to entirely match supply and demand. Jobseekers do not get a job. They suffer deprivation and their human capital does not contribute to societal wealth. An aim of labour market policy is to foster the labour market integration of unemployed jobseekers. When jobseekers encounter the public labour administration they meet with professionals of public employment services (PES).

This paper looks at the interaction between caseworkers and jobseekers in public employment services. It asks: Which role does trust play when caseworkers encounter jobseekers? The paper presents results from an empirical analysis in two German jobcentres. The argumentation is based on a qualitative comparable case study comprising 14 interactions between a caseworker and an unemployed jobseeker. Information is provided by semi-structured interviews with both the 14 caseworkers and jobseekers and further jobcentre professionals, participant observation of consultations, and administrative data of the jobcentres.

The paper argues that trust enables cooperation between caseworkers and jobseekers. Trust is a mechanism of interaction – among others. Coercion and incentive are different mechanisms. However, trust solves both the problem of information and the problem of time. Neither caseworkers nor jobseekers are able to fully check the information they get from the other person, respectively. Furthermore, they always face uncertainty about the other person’s behaviour. When a caseworker places their faith in a jobseeker, or vice versa, they accept their vulnerability by putting resources in the hands of the other person that is free to use these resources. A trustworthy trustee will not use the resources at the expense of the trustor.

In public employment services, there are different modes of interaction: coordination, conflict, and cooperation. When coordinating, caseworkers and jobseekers are both oriented towards labour market integration and neither behaves to the other person’s disadvantage. A conflict situation is characterised by clashing aims and interests. Finally, coordination describes a situation when both caseworkers and jobseekers pursue job placement, but during the process of labour market integration caseworkers and jobseekers face different values of costs and benefits.

In a situation of cooperation, trusting caseworkers and jobseekers are able to resolve their differences in respect of costs and benefits. Strictly speaking, in coordination, there is no need for trust, and in conflict, trust may not reconcile diverging interests. However, a recurring coordination between caseworkers and jobseekers may foster trust and, thus, further interactions within public employment services. Furthermore, if a caseworker trusts a jobseeker in a conflict situation and simultaneously points to the possibility of coercion, e.g. sanctions, the interaction may change from conflict to cooperation.

Co-production has regained increased attention in the wake of digital transformation. Digital co-production, often facilitated through online platforms, fosters collaboration between public professionals and citizens to address societal needs and improve service delivery. Although high expectations are associated with digital co-production, there is currently no consensus within the research and practitioner community on what constitutes success in the context of digital co-production. This makes it difficult to identify the general effectiveness of the concept and the explanatory relevance of the multitude of context factors. The objective of this paper is to develop a theoretical framework for explaining the success of digital co-production and to allow systematic cross-case comparison. To analyse digital co-production success, we use the case of ‘Züri wie neu’ (ZWN, Zurich as Good as New), an established platform enabling citizens to report local infrastructure issues via a mobile and desktop app. The study assesses the framework’s empirical applicability through interviews with the key manager of the platform, staff from within different departments in charge of handling the reports, and secondary data. We pay particular attention to the specific implementation arrangements within the city administration of Zurich and the coordination structures between different administrative actors. Our findings show that ZWN is generally successful and that the intra-administrative implementation and coordination arrangement that emerged after its establishment is crucial for its success. In sum, the pilot study allows us to validate and refine the framework and provides insights into the factors fostering successful digital co-production, advancing understanding of its role in improving public services and collaborative governance.

How do politicians use narratives to claim credit, deflect responsibility, or attribute blame? This study addresses this question by combining insights from Blame Avoidance literature with the Narrative Policy Framework (NPF). It explores how policy actors use storytelling not only for self-presentation but also to shape public perceptions of others. Policy actors may portray themselves as heroes who master crises to claim credit, as victims to deflect responsibility, or attribute blame by creating villains. Empirically, this research focuses on two cases involving Swiss policy actors: the narratives employed by the Swiss Minister of Foreign Affairs during the protracted EU negotiations and the narratives used by the Minister of Health during the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, we analyze the narratives used by the Swiss People's Party acting as main opposition party in both cases. We then analyze how these narrative strategies used for credit claiming, blame avoidance and blaming affect policy implementation and the work of street-level bureaucrats.

Our findings reveal not only the contextual dependency of narrative strategies but also their broader implications for policy-making and implementation. Narratives can amplify polarization, particularly when they involve divisive blame attribution or the monopolization of credit. The study also illuminates how credit-claiming and blame strategies can either reinforce or undermine the legitimacy of public administration and institutions, thereby playing a critical role in the work of street-level bureaucrats. By bridging the gap between Blame Avoidance literature and the NPF, this research advances the theoretical understanding of political communication when facing public pressure. Moreover, it highlights the normative importance of narrative choices in maintaining public trust and reducing polarization in times of uncertainty. Ultimately, this study offers fresh insights into how policy actors’ rhetorical strategies influence the broader dynamics of democratic governance.