The Jigsaw Puzzle of Governance by Soft Terms in Healthcare: Capturing the Neoliberal Impact of Health Policy on Nurses’ Work

The aim of this article is to develop an understanding and explanation of therelations and dynamics between current soft term-based policy and contemporary Danish health-care governance, and in addition establish a link between these dynamics and nurses work in practice. Based on my studies on Inter-professional collaboration, Coherence in healthcare, Patient safety in relation to adverse incidents, and Patient participation, a summative description of habitus is constructed. The studies follow the same methodological approach as praxeologic document-analysis within a similar theoretical framing from Pierre Bourdieu. The different works are unique, but at the same time parts of the jigsaw puzzle of a neoliberal management- and governance practice within the healthcare system. From the construction of habitus, I further discuss the impact of current value-based healthcare governance as the latest addition to this line of governance models. Findings from the analysis and synthesis of the material support that neoliberal politics through management- and governance as soft terms is built into the action of nursing in practice. It has a powerful symbolic impact on structures of social life and social action in relation between health-professionals, and in relation to the patients.Keywords: habitus, management- and governance, neoliberalism, nurses, practice, symbolicpower.