Cover -- Half Title -- Title Page -- Copyright Page -- Table of Contents -- Notes on Contributors -- Foreword: Listening to Talk at Work in the Nordic Welfare Systems -- Part I: Authentic Conversation and the Construction of Meaning in the Microlandscapes of Interaction in the Welfare State -- 1 Images of Encounters in Social Work - with a Focus on Social Interaction, Morality and Gender -- 2 Negotiating Meanings in and Through Interactional Positions in Professional Helping Work -- Part II: Talking with and About Children and Parents at the Workplaces of the Welfare State -- 3 Involvement, Attendance and Participation of Children in Child Protection -- 4 The Social Organisation of Legitimate Risk Assessments in Child Protection: A Study of Backstage Talk and Interaction in a Local Child Protection Agency in Norway -- Part III: Talking About Unemployment, Activation and Career Training in the Welfare State -- 5 Discourses of Activation at Danish Employment Offices -- 6 Counsellors' Responses to Students' Troubles-Talk in Counselling Encounters in Finnish Careers Guidance Training -- Part IV: Clients, Identity and Institutional Talk in the Welfare State -- 7 The Dilemma of Two Cultures in 12-Step Treatment: Professionals' Reponses to Clients Who Act Against Their Best Interests -- 8 Who!? Identity in Institutional Contexts -- 9 Social Work or Bureaucracy? -- Afterword: After Listening - Another Picture of the Nordic Welfare State and its Operations