ABSTRACT
This chapter presents two pieces of research on street level bureaucrats working in different organisational contexts in Italy with the purpose of understanding whether street-level bureaucrats adapt the implementation of New Public Management principles mediating top-down and bottom-up pressures. It employs a qualitative design, combining ethnographic observation of street-level workers-service users' interactions, by shadowing the former, semi-structured interviews and documentary analysis. However, the work of Users' Sector officers was often influenced by social concern for their tenants' situations. Front-line officers confirmed that the most common profile of workers that they met were low-educated, low-skilled and over 40–50 years old. On the other hand, officers showed responsiveness to deserving users' needs through 'proactive behaviour' beyond the sphere of competence and the 'silo mentality'. A direct economic relationship has always regulated, in fact, the interactions between ERAP officers and users, as a formal owner-tenant contract defines the 'expected standards and behaviour'.
