A study of coordinator positionings in family group conferences

Abstract

Although the coordinator is essential in mobilizing and remobilizing the social network of individual participants during the family group conference (FGC) process, we lack knowledge on the coordinators’ meaning and their interaction with various FGC actors. The data in this study come from nine interviews with FGC coordinators conducted as part of a randomized controlled study in which FGCs were implemented in two Norwegian municipalities: Oslo and Bergen. Positioning theory is used as an analytical tool for interpreting the findings. The results indicate that it is a challenge for coordinators to maintain the ideal of the ‘neutral’ coordinator while building trusting relationships with participants. Coordinators’ strategies for managing these challenges are interpreted as discursive positionings that enable communication, trust and participation, potentially securing FGC as an empowering process for the participant. The results indicate that coordinators are crucial actors in carrying out the FGC process.

Keywords:

• family group conference
• coordinator
• facilitator
• neutrality
• positioning

Notes

1. Harré et al. (2009, 12) also regards the concept ‘footing’ (Goffman 1986) as potential to capture and examine participants’ subtle shifts of alignment, and argues that in the terms of their analysis of positioning as occupying first- and second-order statuses, ‘footing’ can be analysed as the third-order status which a person can occupy. We do not apply this concept in our analysis, since we find that it requires data sources more suitable for conducting conversation analysis than our data enables us to.

2. The focus on empirical findings does not imply that the researcher can enter the field and gather the data without an adequate theoretical pre-understanding. A certain degree of theoretical pre-understanding is necessary for developing interview guides relevant to the research area (Repstad 1998). In the present project, documentation of the role of the FGC coordinator was the premise for the interviews conducted.

3. When single quotation marks are used throughout the analysis, it marks the informants’ own concepts and choice of words.