ABSTRACT
The notion that social workers (alongside other public service employee) are best understood as ‘street-level bureaucrats’ has been a familiar part of the social work landscape since this book was published over 40 years ago. The concept is more nuanced that it might seem. Lipsky argues that because public service workers are under-resourced and the demand for their services vastly exceeds supply, they often deal only with the ‘bureaucratically relevant’ aspects of the person they are working with, in spite of their wish to treat citizens as ‘whole’ people. Yet in practice, they exercise wide discretion and operate with relative autonomy. Lipsky therefore proposes that practitioners must look to their own values and professionalism, not rely on bureaucratic control of their practice. We can only agree. The selected passages are from the beginning chapter, which explains what he means by the term ‘street-level bureaucracy’ and why it matters.
