The social nature of health policy implementation – an
                        empirically-grounded reflection on the implementation of integrated care in
                        the fields of mental health and chronic diseases.

Thunus, Sophie; Walker, Carole

doi:10.5334/ijic.s3553

Cited by 1 publication

(2 citation statements)

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“…Fourthly, they draw parallels between policy plans and other documents issued in different contexts and for different purposes. Linking incommensurable events, a process we suggested referring to as "event connectivity" (Thunus et al 2019), might therefore be an important characteristic of coordination performance: it is the way in which they actually make things happen.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…It allows coordinators to attach sense and substance to ongoing processes that cut across multiple arenas and unfold in an experimental and uncertain framework. We suggest referring to this practice as "event connectivity" (Thunus et al 2019), which emphasizes how, by linking originally separate events, the coordinators enact one of the possible futures of either policy plan.…”

Section: Meetings and Interpreting Documentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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What Do Coordinators Do? Mental Health Policy Implementation as Translation

Darcis

Thunus

2020

Administrative Sciences

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Coordination is described as a widespread function emerging in relation to policy plans inducing collaboration between different sectors, organizations and professions. This paper suggests seeing the implementation phase as a translation process, one where the content of policy plans is reinvented primarily through discussion rather than linearly transferred from the political to the professional arena. It focuses on the function of coordinator with a view to examining how this function is performed and questions its influence on the local translation of both policy plans. The data collection was part of two research projects focusing on the reform of Belgian mental healthcare and the creation of care pathways for forensic patients, combining document analysis, interviews (n = 82) and observations (n = 58). The results highlight the inherent ambiguity of the coordinators’ working environment, the socially-disputed nature of their function and define the coordinators as connection-makers who exert power over processes rather than people or structures. It demonstrates that coordinators influence the policy process by inducing discussions at meetings and the documents subsequently produced. In conclusion, this paper defines coordinators as process managers whose work largely consists of translating policy plans through event connectivity and contextualizing practices. Given the importance of translation in policy implementation, this paper calls for a reconsideration of policy evaluation as well as of the coordinators’ recruitment and training procedures.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Meetings and Interpreting Documentsmentioning

confidence: 99%