The aim of the study was to investigate social workers' conditions and experiences of working with children and adolescents who have a criminal and norm-breaking behaviour. This is to gain an understanding of social crime prevention and social services' work with the target group. We chose to use a qualitative method where we interviewed six social workers who work in social services with children and adolescents. When the interviews were completed, we analyzed them with the help of the qualitative content analysis which resulted in three themes: the target group's problems and its risk and protection factors, working methods and efforts within the social service, and the room for action and its impact on the work. When analyzing the results, we used our theoretical concepts, Bronfenbrenner's ecological development theory and the concept of action space, as well as the knowledge overview to create an understanding of the content of the interviews. From the results, it emerged that the perception of a criminal and norm-breaking behavior did not have a clear definition, and that the majority of respondents did not consider that they worked with crime prevention. They also considered that early intervention was effective, as well as working with the entire child's network where cooperation is an important component to achieve results. With regard to the room for action, they considered that they had a relatively large room for action, but that resources and politics set the mark on how large. In the conclusion, the importance of a functioning collaboration is highlighted and that the way of working differs depending on what the municipality's priorities look like, thus the political control becomes decisive in how the social service is able to carry out its activities. In this way, preventive work could have been developed if the conditions were the same in all municipalities.