Hester Paanakker

Second, there is a paucity of empirical knowledge on the extent to which public value approaches actually converge within and between different public sector levels, from policy level down to implementation level. In addition, the impact on public service delivery of value approaches when they are convergent or divergent remains unclear. Whether it matters if value approaches towards the frontline craft are alike or not, and, if they don’t, whether this is a desirable predicament, and whether strong divergence causes problems – have all remained unresearched. To address these issues, the thesis aimed to advance insight on the dynamics and effects of value convergence and value divergence in the public domain, explicitly throughout a specific policy sector. Using a mix of interviews ( N =55), participatory observations and document analysis in an explorative case study of the Dutch prison system, the following central research question was addressed: How convergent are public officials’ value approaches toward street-level craft in the Dutch prison sector, and in what way does value convergence or divergence affect administrative practice? Data collected in two prisons, including in-depth interviews with 32 street-level prison officers, nine middle managers, and eight prison managing directors, and, in addition, six policy advisors working at ministerial level, provided a rich and elaborate dataset on values, craft, convergence and perceived effects. The data was subjected to a rigorous analysis by means of an extensive computer-assisted coding process (MAXQDA) to compare value approaches and dynamics on different dimensions, as well as within and between the different levels of the prison hierarchy. Throughout the thesis, value convergence or divergence is seen as a sliding scale (from very convergent value approaches to very divergent value approaches) on three dimensions: value identification (which types of values matter), value understanding (how the meaning of these values is interpreted), and value prioritization or enactment (which values are actually emphasized in practice, and how). The result is an analysis of what respondents deem important indicators of (the effectuation) of street-level craft, what value patterns can be inferred from this, and how this impacts and interacts with values, behaviors, attitudes, and practical problems in public service delivery in the prison. 162 Chapter 7