Prevention at the Front Line: How home nurses, pedagogues, and teachers transform public worry into decisions on special efforts

Abstract Within recent years, Denmark has implemented a number of preventive policies based on the line of reasoning that it is better to prevent than to solve problems. Preventive policies express political intentions aimed at solving core welfare state problems, but policy goals are ambiguous and vague, and policy tools are often poorly specified. Thus, front-line workers (FLWs) are pinpointed as key persons to implement these policies, because they hold a ‘specific knowledge’ about and ‘close acquaintance’ with citizens. In the article, we explore different types of front-line work, implementing preventive policies, and identifying children in need of a special effort.