Expectations towards home care re-ablement in Danish municipalities

Abstract

Purpose – Re-abling care of frail older people is highly on the agenda in several countries. The purpose of this paper is to have a closer look at the argumentation used for its establishment by local policy actors in the field and the kind of expectations towards the behaviour of frail older people it entails. Design/methodology/approach – The empirical material consists of qualitative interviews with 17 local policy actors in two Danish municipalities. The interviews have been analysed with the help of argumentative discourse analysis. Findings – The most important argument for re-abling care appears to be grounded in economic reasons. However, a second, moral argument was found revolving around the older peoples’ activity, which contributes to the establishment of moral expectations towards frail older people to be active. Research limitations/implications – As the goal of the study was to analyse understandings and values of key local actors, the implementation of re-ablement programmes and the users’ perspective were not studied. Originality/value – The paper contributes to the investigation of the shift from universal entitlement as a right to towards market rationalities in Danish elder care.