Street‐level bureaucrats,rule‐following and tenure: How assessment tools are used at the front line of the public sector

Studies on street‐level bureaucracy examine actions of frontline workers within the public sector. In this literature, there is a lack of evidence on how job tenure affects how frontline workers respond to formal steering. We contribute to prior research by studying the nationwide introduction of an assessment support tool to be used by caseworkers to assess clients’ needs under the Swedish active labour market policy. We examine the potential effects of tenure on how caseworkers use this tool. The empirical analysis is based on quantitative and qualitative data. We show that as tenure increases, street‐level bureaucrats, especially male caseworkers, tend to act in accordance with policy signals to a lesser extent. The qualitative analysis shows that this pattern can partly be explained by the fact that increasing experience with meeting clients face to face increases caseworkers’ perceived confidence and skills.     

Chinese Proposal,Global Echoes

The development philosophy of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), one of President Xi Jinping's signature projects, has reverberated across the international community following its splendid achievements benefiting people across its participating countries. Over the past eight years, regions across China have opened wider to the world through the initiative, and win-win cooperation has been achieved between China and participating countries, Xi said at a symposium on the initiative on November 19.     

The Belt and Road Initiative Leads To Sustainable Development

<正>The 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China(CPC)stressed that the Belt and Road Initiative will be carried forward to promote international cooperation and continue to take an active part in reforming and developing the global governance system and reviving the sluggish global economy.     

From human rights to human dignity

Abstract

Mainstream human rights ideas that most of us are familiar with today evolved from the European Enlightenment and the secularization of thought and society of the last 150 years. These ideas have contributed significantly to human civilization in at least four ways. One, they have endowed the individual with certain basic rights such as the right of free speech, the right of association, the right to a fair trial, and so on. Two, they have strengthened the position of the ordinary citizen against the arbitrariness of power. Three, they have expanded the space and scope for individual participation in public decision-making. Four, they have forced the state and authority in general to be accountable to the public.