Coherent Triads : Observed Successful Collaboration in Youth Care

Earlier research on collaboration shows that cooperation comprises problems and conflicts. The purpose of this study is to describe successful collaboration even if it unfolds during shorter interaction frequencies. In the article, interactive patterns involved in the construction of these phenomena will be analyzed. Forming the empirical basis for this study are 119 field observations of organized meetings and informal meetings before and after organized meetings, during visits to youth care institutions in Sweden, social services offices, and the Swedish National Board of Institutional Care. In this study, markers are used to define successful cooperation in the empirical material, so that actors who belong to at least three different categories will be identified. The professional actors can also shape a coherent triad with young people or parents in cases where past conflicts arise. When some professionals create a distance from other professional partners, conflicts can be erased so as to generate new conditions for coherence of the triad. Construction and reconstruction of collaboration success is an ongoing, interactive process. Presentation of the proper interaction moral is created and re-created during interactions and appears in the myriad everyday interactions