A Healthy City for All? Social Services’ Roles in Collaborative Urban Development

Dados Bibliográficos

ID22017960
AutoresLina Berglund-Snodgrass (0000-0003-3003-0457, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences), Maria Fjellfeldt (0000-0001-9836-6446, Dalarna University), Ebba Högström (0000-0002-7725-1233, Blekinge Institute of Technology), Urban Markström (0000-0002-6330-5640, Umeå University)
Ano2022
Volume7
Fascículo4
Data de publicação2022-10-18
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoUrban Planning (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 2183-7635 • E-ISSN: 2183-7635
EditoraCogitatio (PUBLISHER • PT)
DOI10.17645/up.v7i4.5620
OpenAlexW4306696306
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas1
Referências citadas35

There is broad consensus among policymakers about the urgency of developing healthy, inclusive, and socially sustainable cities. In the Swedish context, social services are considered to have knowledge that needs to be integrated into the broader urban development processes in order to accomplish such ends. This article aims to better understand the ways in which social service officials collaborate in urban development processes for developing the social dimensions of healthy cities. We draw from neo-institutional theories, which set out actors (e.g., social service officials) as acting according to a logic of appropriateness , which means that actors do what they see as appropriate for themselves in a specific type of situation. Based on semi-structured interviews with social services officials in 10 Swedish municipalities on their experiences of collaboration in the development of housing and living environments for people with psychiatric disabilities, we identified that they act based on (a) a pragmatic rule of conduct through the role of the problem solver, (b) a bureaucratic rule of conduct through the role of the knowledge provider, and (c) activist rule of conduct through the role of the advocator. In these roles, they have little authority in the development processes, and are unable to set the agenda for the social dimensions of healthy cities but act as the moral consciousness by looking out for everyone’s right to equal living conditions in urban development

Bureaucracy · Political science · Politics · Public relations · Sociology · Geriatric Care and Nursing Homes · Healthcare innovation and challenges · Law · Mental Health and Patient Involvement · Social Work