From Discretion to Calculation: How Analog Automation Shaped Digitalization of Finnish Social Assistance

ABSTRACT Automation in public administration is often seen as a recent, purely digital phenomenon that transforms decision‐making and governance. This article challenges that view by elucidating a historical continuum in the automation of administrative decision‐making. It introduces the concept of analog automation to highlight how complex social, organizational, legal, and historical factors have impacted decision‐makers' discretionary space and paved the way for digital automation. Drawing on public administration, science and technology studies, and sociolegal scholarship, the article uses analog automation to study the gradual yet significant change of automation in Finland's social assistance system over four decades. Analysis of legislative and policy documents shows how discretionary space has been gradually restricted by changes in organizational structures and practices and their adoption into legal obligations. The article provides historical context to current debates on digital transformation, showing how long‐standing institutional developments enable automation and how standardization and discretion have become increasingly intertwined.