The Digital Cage Dilemma – How Street-Level Bureaucrats at Public Libraries are a Key for Digital Inclusion

Abstract

Ten percent of the Swedish population over the age of sixteen can be counted as digitally excluded. Many of them turn to public libraries for support with e.g. public e-services. As street-level bureaucrats, library staff can support citizens’ digital inclusion within the scope of their assignment and institutional framework. However, they face dilemmas when they encounter citizens with needs that fall partly outside this framework. According to a classic work of Weber, bureaucrats can be seen as locked in an iron cage of rules and norms. It could be argued that digitalization is changing the conditions in bureaucracies even further. As a complement to Weber’s iron cage, Peeters and Widlak described the disciplining logic of digital information architecture as a form of digital cage that can exclude citizens and frame the discretion of street-level bureaucrats. This article elaborates on the concept digital cage, built on the iron cage concept, to analyse how street-level bureaucrats cope with discretionary boundaries in their work for citizens’ digital inclusion. Based on an analysis of interviews with library staff at local centres for digital inclusion, policy documents and interviews with local politicians in charge of these centres, the study shows the relevance of the digital cage concept and that the use of new technologies changes and partly limits street-level discretion. However, it also shows that politicians allow library staff a considerable degree of freedom in their work, and that the centres’ focus on face-to-face meetings and entrepreneurial solutions is an asset for digital inclusion.