Between prevention and repression. The construction of preventive work in Swedish Social Policy discourse – a discourse analysis

Abstract

The following study examines how preventive work is constructed within contemporary Swedish social policy discourse, focusing on the underlying ideologies affecting the construction. The study explores how preventive measures are represented in relation to youth criminality and stricter sanctions through a discourse analysis of the three government policy documents: Ju förr desto bättre- vägar till en förebyggande socialtjänst (2018), Proposition-Säkerhetszoner(2023) and Särpta regler om ungdomsövervakning och starffreduktion för unga (2024). The analysis is guided by Bacchi’s What’s the problem represented to be? (WPR) approach and Laclau and Mouffe’s discourse analysis. The findings reveal significant variation in how preventive work is constructed depending on which document is explored. One of the documents frames preventive work within a Swedish welfare-based, social democratic perspective, emphasizing long-term and structural measures. While the two others associate prevention with repressive, controlling security measures with a punitive populistic and neoliberal focus. Additionally, preventive work is in the study identified as an empty signifier, making it a powerful political tool for legitimizing different policy agendas. The analysis furthermore highlights the increasing influence of punitive populism in Swedish penal and social policy, especially when it comes to responding to the described increase in youth criminality. The study concludes with the point that although preventive work is framed as a progressive concept and the answer to social problems such as youth criminality, there is a clear increase in the use of the term to justify repressive and control-oriented measures. This raises concern regarding the balance between social protection, individual rights and public security.