Veronica Bergström PhD student

I am a PhD candidate in Social Work at Stockholm University and part of the research programme Social Services’ Work in Crime Prevention – Approaches, Conditions, and Outcomes. The programme is conducted in collaboration between the Department of Social Work, the Department of Criminology, and the City of Stockholm, with an overarching focus on how social services function as an arena for crime prevention.

My doctoral thesis examines how selection processes are shaped within social services’ crime-preventive work with young people, and how these processes determine who is offered support, who is left without support, and who declines it. The study combines quantitative and qualitative methods to analyse how selection processes are expressed in social services’ decisions, documentation, and social workers’ professional assessments. The analysis spans institutional, professional, and discursive levels and illustrates how boundaries of support are constructed, justified, and legitimised. The thesis therefore aims to shed light on how social services function as both an inclusive and an exclusive arena in crime-preventive work, and on the mechanisms that shape young people’s access to support.

I am a trained social worker with professional experience in child and youth welfare, focusing on participation, rights, and preventive interventions. Previously, I have worked with assessments and arrangements of contact between placed children and their parents, and as a project manager for an integration project targeting youth at risk of criminal involvement, which resulted in permanently implemented working methods.

I hold a Master’s degree in Social Work from Stockholm University (2024) and have previously worked as a research assistant in the Forte-funded project Social Climate and Victimisation in Residential Care Institutions for Children and Youth, where I contributed to the collection and analysis of survey and interview data with young people living in HVB - and SiS homes.