Alignment and service user participation in low-threshold meetings with people using drugs

The chapter examines multi-agency meetings in low-threshold services for people using drugs in Finland. It approaches the data extracts as examples of collaborative service user participation accomplished as an interactional achievement in situ and applies the concept of alignment as a linguistic device in which meeting participants cooperate in interactions. It demonstrates how markers of aligning make the interaction flow in a cooperative direction, and how, for example, question-answer sequences and positioning of both service users and professionals in alternating ways as ‘tellers’ and ‘recipients’ are essential alignment techniques to advance collaborative participation. It concludes that participation is never complete but always partially achieved and is at risk of failing.