Background.: As front-line service providers who often work in systems regulated by governmental bodies, occupational therapists can be conceptualized as "street-level bureaucrats" ( Lipsky, 1980/2010 ) who effect and are affected by policy.
Purpose.: Drawing on understandings from a study of long-term unemployment, this article proposes that occupational therapists, as street-level bureaucrats, respond to inter-related policies and systems in ways that can perpetuate, resist, or transform opportunities for doing and being.
Key issues.: By highlighting practitioners' everyday negotiation of governmental, organizational, and professional power relations, the notion of street-level bureaucracy illuminates the political nature of practice as well as the possibilities and boundaries that policy can place on ideal forms and outcomes of practice.
Implications.: Framing occupational therapists as street-level bureaucrats reinforces practitioners' situatedness as political actors. Mobilizing this framing can enhance awareness of occupational therapists' exercise of discretion, which can be investigated as a basis for occupation-focused and emancipatory forms of practice.
Keywords: Bureaucratie de la rue; Ergothérapie; Occupational therapy; Policy; Politique; Practice; Pratique; Street level.