RT Book
T1 When the state meets the street: public service and moral agency
A1 Zacka, Bernardo 1983-
LA English
PP Cambridge, Massachusetts London, England
PB The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
YR 2017
UL https://krimdok.uni-tuebingen.de/Record/886360161
AB When the State Meets the Street probes the complex moral lives of street-level bureaucrats: the frontline social and welfare workers, police officers, and educators who represent government's human face to ordinary citizens. Too often dismissed as soulless operators, these workers wield a significant margin of discretion and make decisions that considerably affect people's lives. By combining insights from political theory with ethnographic fieldwork as a receptionist in an urban anti-poverty agency, Bernardo Zacka shows us firsthand the predicament in which these public servants are caught up. Public policy consists of rules and regulations, but its implementation depends on how street-level bureaucrats interpret them and exercise discretionary judgment. These workers are expected to act as sensible moral agents in a working environment that is notoriously challenging and that conspires against them. Pressed to cope with the pressures of everyday work, they often and unknowingly settle for reductive conceptions of their responsibilities. Zacka examines the factors that contribute to this erosion of moral sensibility and what it takes to remain a balanced moral agent in such adverse conditions.--
AB When the State Meets the Street probes the complex moral lives of street-level bureaucrats: the frontline social and welfare workers, police officers, and educators who represent government's human face to ordinary citizens. Too often dismissed as soulless operators, these workers wield a significant margin of discretion and make decisions that considerably affect people's lives. By combining insights from political theory with ethnographic fieldwork as a receptionist in an urban anti-poverty agency, Bernardo Zacka shows us firsthand the predicament in which these public servants are caught up. Public policy consists of rules and regulations, but its implementation depends on how street-level bureaucrats interpret them and exercise discretionary judgment. These workers are expected to act as sensible moral agents in a working environment that is notoriously challenging and that conspires against them. Pressed to cope with the pressures of everyday work, they often and unknowingly settle for reductive conceptions of their responsibilities. Zacka examines the factors that contribute to this erosion of moral sensibility and what it takes to remain a balanced moral agent in such adverse conditions.--
NO Index: Seite 329-337
NO Includes bibliographical references and index
CN JF1601
SN 9780674545540
K1 Civil service : Moral and ethical aspects : Northeastern States
K1 Municipal officials and employees : Northeastern States
K1 Local Government : Moral and ethical aspects : Northeastern States
K1 Civil service
K1 Municipal officials and employees
K1 Local Government
K1 Northeastern States
K1 Northeastern States : Officials and employees
K1 Staat : Repräsentant : Sozialarbeiter : Streetwork : Polizeibeamter : Moralisches Handeln