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Organizing consent: The role of procedural fairness in political trust and compliance

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2026

Marcia Grimes
Marcia Grimes*
Affiliation:
Göteborg University, Sweden
*
Address for correspondence: Marcia Grimes, Department of Political Science, Göteborg University, Box 711, 405 30 Göteborg, Sweden. Tel.: +46 31 773 5195; Fax: +46 31 773 4480; E‐mail: marcia.grimes@cefos.gu.se
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Abstract

Political theory often attributes democratic legitimacy to the fairness of the processes by which collective decisions are taken; empirical research by contrast has primarily investigated whether citizens' approval of democratic institutions derives from satisfaction with the substantive output of those institutions. This article examines whether assessments of decision‐making processes shape public willingness to consent to authority. The role of procedural fairness in institutional legitimacy has previously only been investigated in the context of the United States, and has fallen short of demonstrating that procedural assessments actually have a causal effect on institutional legitimacy. Panel survey data of attitudes in a large‐scale land use issue provide the empirical base of the analysis. The results indicate that assessments of procedural fairness have a bearing on two conceptualizations of subjective legitimacy: respondents' trust for the authority and their willingness to accept a decision outcome.

Information

Type
Original Articles
Information
European Journal of Political Research , Volume 45 , Issue 2 , March 2006 , pp. 285 - 315
Copyright
Copyright © 2006 The Authors. Journal compilation © 2006 (European Consortium for Political Research)

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