Workers resist procedural change because it threatens coping routines, not novelty

Evidence

Undoubtedly there are many street-level bureaucrats who refuse to accept the perspectives of their jobs that arise in the occupational subculture. Still, the strength of mechanisms adopted to cope with the work is great precisely because, if they are successful coping devices, they work (by definition). The need to cope acts as a barrier to anomalous information that might challenge the routines and orientations that have been developed over time. Changes in procedures are not necessarily resisted because workers are against change per se, but because change threatens the existence of coping routines and orientations that serve to rationalize the work. Similarly, anomalous information is not heard because it contradicts assumptions that make the job more rewarding or rationalizes its contradictions. — Michael Lipsky, Street-Level Bureaucracy, 843

Categorization

• recurring: this claim recurs 2 times within its source
• XREF: connects to: Workers resist management rationing only when it threatens their own preferred practice — Michael Lipsky, Street-Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of…, 729; Worker stress-control routines signal how far agency goals are achievable — Michael Lipsky, Street-Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of…, 635; Workers resist algorithmic control by asserting mastery over their trade. — Donatella della Porta et al., Mobilizing Against the Odds: Solidarity…, 104

Broader Connections

• Worker stress-control routines signal how far agency goals are achievable #exemplifies (0.80) — Michael Lipsky, Street-Level Bureaucracy, 635