Thinking & Acting Missionally: A Reflection on Lipsky’s Chapters 2 & 7

When I began watching the video (DeVoogd, 2018) and reading Lipsky (2010), I realized I wasn’t sure what the definition of a street level bureaucrat is. I thought it was the same as the as the “anonymous bureaucrat” described by Rippner (2016), but when I looked it up and got the definition, I found I was incorrect. I am clearly an anonymous bureaucrat, but I don't think I’m a street level bureaucrat. According to Lipsky (1969), street level bureaucrats are the intermediaries between the government and the public; their jobs are to implement policy but rarely have formal responsibility for the development or evaluation of it. In public higher education, these are the people who work directly with students and parents, particularly in places like service centers where people buy parking passes, get IDs, and add money to debit cards; financial aid offices; and student health centers. I’m convinced that unlike public school teachers, faculty are not street level bureaucrats as they don’t work with the public and have explicit authority to create and evaluate policy via shared governance. I don’t think student service professionals or academic staff and administration are either. I also think some of the other lower level university employees, such as the workers in facilities, are not street level bureaucrats.

While I agree with the video introduction that sometimes street level bureaucrats blame the victim (for example, slacking students) or find themselves caught between competing policies, goals, and their own lack of power, I have to mention that many managers see street level bureaucrats who think and act missionally as troublemakers or stepping out of their lane. There are real penalties for these workers, and it is not uncommon for this backlash to be the beginning of burnout. As an anonymous bureaucrat, I have, more than once, been burned by leadership when I am simply trying to do my job of providing California with a civically engaged professional workforce. My leadership seemingly has no problem putting community engagement in the strategic plan and simultaneously questioning minor budgetary expenses to support it and even if I, as representative of this strategic priority, should be in the room when related policies are being discussed. Street level bureaucrats also are policed by their supervisors to stay in their lanes and do their jobs. High level people are just as turfy as low level people, in my experience.

The ideas expressed in the video that street level bureaucrats see reality as fixed, rather than something that can be improved or changed over time, and that they see their job descriptions as limited, are interesting. I would like to read further on this and would appreciate related citations. I am also curious about Lipsky’s methodology; how did he collect this information?

Before I worked in higher ed, I was the Program Director of the Volunteer Center of Rhode Island. Part of my job was to provide professional development for volunteer program coordinators who are professional staff at nonprofits. We had a saying, “working on the mission is the privilege of the volunteer.” For example, it was the volunteers who got to work with the animals at the animal shelter while the professional staff were responsible for the facility, organization management, evaluation, and fund development. The same could be said for the false dichotomy between street level bureaucrats and management; the street level bureaucrats are the ones who work directly with the students to make sure their needs are met, while the management makes sure the budget functions and that retention is measured and plans are in place to increase it.

In my experience, it is the lower ranking people who provide the institutional memory and provide the consistency of the institution that makes that institution unique. The leadership comes and goes; but the street level bureaucrats are the ones who do the subtle work of making sure that the institution fits the needs and goals of students. Many times, in fact, they take advantage of the leadership turnover to create policy and procedure that they have long desired; not just for their own comfort but for the students’. Lower level folks think that supporting the students is the mission; “lower level participants in organizations often do not share the perspectives and preferences of their superiors and hence in some respect cannot be thought to be working toward stated agency goals” (Lipsky, 2010, p. 16). Some may not be thinking missionally and critically, but others are, and are simply coming to different conclusions. And many of these people are graduates of our institutions; if they’re not thinking critically and missionally, and aren't empowered to implement their ideas, isn’t that just an indictment of the education we provide and the leadership we employ?

References

DeVoogd, G. (2018). Personal conversation.
Lipsky, M. (1969). Toward a Theory of Street-Level Bureaucracy (IRP Discussion Papers No. 48-69). Madison, WI: Institute for Research on Poverty (IRP), University of Wisconsin.
Lipsky, M. (2010 originally published in 1980). Street-Level bureaucracy: Dilemmas of the individual in public services. Russel Sage, New York.
Rippner, J. (2016). The American education policy landscape.
Simon, D. (Writer), & Zakrzewski, A. (Director). (11/21/04). The Wire, Season 3, Episode 9, Slapstick [Television broadcast]. In Blown Deadline Productions (Producer). USA: Home Box Office (HBO).