Professionellt pappersgöra : Att bemästra ett komplext handlingsutrymme i beslutstexter om ekonomiskt bistånd

Sammanfattning: Social assistance is the last safety net of the Swedish welfare system. It is designed to aid those individuals whom cannot support themselves through funds or income, including any form of social security. The Social Services Act, the law that regulates social assistance, is a framework law which focuses on the outcome of the assistance rather than the basis of eligibility assessment. At the same time the work of assessing social assistance is often seen as bureaucratic and heavily regulated by law.The aim of the thesis is to investigate and analyse justifications of decisions regarding social assistance, with a focus on social workers’ paperwork, and the conditions for professional practice by paying attention to discretionary aspects. The study was conducted by analysing social assistance decision texts and interviewing social workers in individual and group interviews. The study addresses the following research questions: (1) what discretion do the social workers reckon they have, and what do they reckon frames their discretion, (2) how do the social workers relate to these frames, (3) in what situations do the social workers choose to actively expand their discretion, and (4) how can the discretion of the social workers be understood?The findings show that the social workers relate to three frames when making decisions: the legal frame, the political frame and the collegial frame. The legal frame works as a minimum level both when it comes to what the social assistance includes and is regulated by law, preparatory works and precedents. The political frame is regulated by the municipal guidelines and works as an upper limit for the social assistance. Lastly the social workers relate to the collegial frame consisting of local workplace norms. The social workers can comply with all three frames, compliant discretion, or contest one of the frames when making decisions, contested discretion. There is always a potential of one or more of the frames reviewing the decisions. This potential review goes beyond the visual analogy of the panopticon and can be understood as a pantognostis, an omniscient reviewer.