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The Problem Of Unwanted Pets: A Case Study In How Institutions “Think” About Clients’ Needs, Leslie Irvine

Leslie Irvine, PhD

The research on organizational framing and the metaphor of institutional “thinking” highlight the ways that social problems organizations shape the ameliorative services they deliver. Social problems work then perpetuates representations of problems that may not match the conditions clients face. This study extends social problems literature to argue that organizations sometimes “think” differently about the problems they intend to solve than do persons involved with these problems in everyday life. Using ethnographic research and interviews, this article contrasts the way in which animal sheltering, as an institution, frames the problem of unwanted animals with how the public interprets that problem. …