User participation in childcare services – a dispositive analysis

Abstract

User participation, i.e. active client participation in shaping a particular help effort, is seen as rudimentary in securing that the help which is offered, is in accordance with clients’ needs. Little research has been conducted on the topic of user participation within childcare services. Nevertheless, certain findings are clear. In spite of the ideals and aims of user participation, studies show that the childcare services have had limited success in involving their users (here understood as parents) in defining their need for help. Parents often ex- perience that they are neither listened to, nor able to affect outcomes when meeting with childcare services. This article has its origin in the perplexity of this overall tendency and examines why user participation, despite its declared benefit, remains 100 Abstracts difficult to secure. The article demonstrates that limited parental influence is associated with the adherence of childcare services to an overarching logic that predefined children’s needs and interests, thus delimiting the room for negotiated solutions. The empirical material is video films of conversations between employees and users within the childcare services, and interviews with parents and caseworkers. The article makes use of Foucault’s ‘dispositive’ analysis, with the aim of identifying the di- rectives that form the meetings between users and employees. The article shows how employees and parents are subordinated a ‘dispositive’ that instructs practise. The ‘dispositive’ that seems to be active here is “the consideration for the child” or “the best interest of the child”. The notion of “The best for the child” appears as a general superior force that sometimes disregards recognition for the uniqueness of each child and their situation. In this way, the freedom to exercise user participation is limited for both employees and users. Ironically, as both parties are governed by such overarching directives, there is a risk that the very pur- pose of the directives, which is the best interest of the child, is undermined. Through the analysis we can see what sort of actions or practices are being preferred. The article shows how work practices are governed by an overarching logic that cannot immediately be seen, but requires extensive analysis to be discovered. The article aims, through its ‘dispositive’ analysis, to inspire further research that might understand how superior patterns regulate and give guidelines to work practices.