Street-level bureaucrats are defined by direct citizen contact plus discretion
Evidence
Public service workers who interact directly with citizens in the course of their jobs, and who have substantial discretion in the exe_cution of their work are called street-level bureaucrats in this study. Public service agencies that employ a significant number of street-level bureaucrats in proportion to their work force are called street-level bureaucracies. Typical street-level bureaucrats are teachers, police officers and other law enforcement personnel, social workers, judges, public lawyers and other court officers, health workers, and many other public employees who grant access to government programs and provide services within them. — Michael Lipsky, Street-Level Bureaucracy, 71
Categorization
- DEFINE: The canonical working definition of street-level bureaucrat: direct citizen interaction plus substantial execution discretion.
- XREF: connects to: Street-level bureaucrats are frontline workers exercising substantial job discretion; Street-level bureaucrats are controversial because their policy is immediate and personal, unlike remote programs — Michael Lipsky, Street-Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of…, 105; Most street-level bureaucrats stay dedicated to objectives they redefine themselves. — Michael Lipsky, Street-Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of…, 1062