Doing Ambivalence: Embracing Policy Innovation—At Arm's Length

Abstract

This article considers the social organization of responses among human service staff to changes in public policy, using a study of a Swedish treatment center for juveniles as an illustration. The stance toward a new treatment ideology, “family-work,” was not one of either accepting or rejecting the new policy; the staff conveyed both embracing and distancing. Policy innovations, it is argued, create conditions that work as a catalyst for “doing ambivalence,” an accommodative rhetoric that integrates the new and subtly expresses reservations.

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