The turn towards co-creation within the Norwegian welfare state: community work in new clothing?

ABSTRACT

Recent years have seen both a proliferation and an evolution of forms of user involvement related to efforts made within or by the welfare state. New forms of user involvement relate to both increased and changed engagement by recipients of the welfare state in terms of services, policies, or research.

In this explorative paper, one such form, that of ‘co-creation’, is discussed in the context of the evolving Norwegian welfare state. In this context, we argue that an empowering model of co-creation is disregarded in favour of a pragmatic model in which co-creation can be seen as an instrument of governance.

Furthermore, we discuss a ‘turn toward co-creation’ in the context of approaches and ideologies from community work. We discuss whether co-creation represents a novel take on collaboration and the joint efforts among stakeholders, or whether it reads as a rebranding of approaches and concepts already embedded in community work. We argue that the ways in which co-creation is implemented, in the form of a pragmatic approach based on instrumental rationality, may run counter to its original intent and constitutes a turn away from the core values and practices of community work.

KEYWORDS:

• Community work
• empowerment
• methods in social work
• social policy

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank the “Community Work” research group at Western Norway University of Applied Sciences for their response to an early draft of this paper. We are especially indebted to Kristina Bakke Åkerblom for providing thorough and insightful feedback on an early draft and likewise to Padmaja Barua for providing input on a later draft.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).