Hester Paanakker

30 and prof.dr. Leo Huberts (the supervisors of this thesis) and has been submitted to a journal. The chapter answers the third and final research question of this thesis and discusses the implications of value divergence in public sector organizations and the need for further exploration. It offers propositions for future research. 1.6 Academic Relevance of the Thesis This thesis hopes to make a contribution –in academic work as well as in policy practice– to insights on the role of public values. As this introduction has explicated, viewing public values and value convergence in terms of frontline craft harbors a number of advantages that may advance public values theory. Theoretically, considering values from the perspective of frontline craft has the potential to show how to uniquely localize the normative underpinnings of good work. It complements and brings together the often loosely coupled bodies of literature on street-level work and professionalism on the one hand, and public values literature on the other. It may provide more in-depth understanding of how abstract public values apply to the concrete work context(s) in frontline public service delivery, and how various actors see the salience and centrality of values to the meaning of such street-level work. Moreover, with the results it describes this thesis aims to make a contribution to the unexplored field of value convergence in public governance. The thesis contributes empirical insight into the extent, nature, and effects of value convergence and divergence in the public sector. It is unique in its comparison of value approaches not only within but also between different hierarchical levels of public policy sectors. As such, it sets out to provide rich and in-depth description and explanation of the mechanisms at play when values are interpreted and negotiated down vertical lines of a public sector hierarchy.The specific focus on the tangible and hands-on craft in public service delivery at the frontline adds to the novelty of the research, and provides further exploration of the renewed attention to craftsmanship in the public domain. To date, the empirical examination of public craftsmanship is a field still in its infancy. Methodologically, the thesis adds value by examining values from the bottom-up as identified and expressed by public officials themselves. It moves away from using predetermined and predefined sets of values in the empirical study of public values, and can identify the practitioners’ implicit views that bear significant weight in how public officials think, act, and 30 Chapter 1