Listening to the Welfare State presents, for the first time in English, central research findings from recent studies of the welfare systems of Denmark, Norway, Finland and Sweden. The book's contributors are leading investigators of face-to-face encounters between welfare professionals and clients in these systems. All have collected their data through ethnographic observations as well as taped recordings of these meetings. By subjecting their data to conversation and discourse analyses, these researchers provide a richly detailed empirical picture of the various forms of talk-at-work constituting the core activity of a variety of street-level bureaucracies. Their findings provide a well-rounded body of knowledge about what happens when professionals meet persons seeking financial assistance, child protection, employment, vocational counselling, treatment, rehabilitation and related services. Essential reading for both professional and students, this book will provide a wealth of insights into and understandings of, the micro-level workings of welfare state systems.

Contents: Authentic Conversation and the Construction of Meaning in the Micro landscapes of Interaction in the Welfare State: Images of encounters in social work - with a focus on social interaction, morality and gender, Christian Kullberg and Elisabet Cedersund; Negotiating meanings in and through interactional positions in professional helping work, Arja Jokinen, Kirsi Juhila and Eero Souninen. Talking With and About Children and Parents at the Workplaces of the Welfare State: Involvement, attendance and participation of children in child protection, Hannele Forsberg; The social organization of legitimate risk assessments in child protection: a study of backstage talk and interaction in a local child protection agency in Norway, Ã...se Vagli. Talking About Unemployment, Activation and Career Training in the Welfare State: Discourses of activation at Danish employment offices, Sÿren Peter Olesen; Counsellors' responses to students' troubles-talk in counselling encounters in Finnish careers guidance training, Sanna Vehvilÿinen. Clients, Identity and Institutional Talk in the Welfare State: The dilemma of two cultures in 12-step treatment: professionals' responses to clients who act against their best interests, Ilkka Arminen and Amnna Leppo; Who!? identity in institutional contexts, Lars-Christer Hydén; Social work or bureaucracy?, Ilmari Rostila; Afterword: after listening - another picture of the Nordic welfare state and its operations, Sÿren Peter Olensen.