Diffuse Institutional Trust and Specific Institutional Mistrust in Nordic Participatory Planning: Experience from Contested Urban Projects

ABSTRACT

Trust is vital in participatory planning. To explore the complex relationships between participation and various dimensions of trust and mistrust, this article develops a framework of analysis distinguishing between specific and diffuse forms of institutional trust and mistrust, and illustrates its relevance via two case studies of urban and transport planning in Finland and Sweden. We explore the dynamic coexistence of mistrust towards the specific planning organisations in charge of the projects with the strong ‘diffuse’ trust in the generic institutions of representative democracy and Nordic planning. The proposed approach can help harness mistrustful civic vigilance for deliberative purposes.

KEYWORDS:

• Citizen participation
• communicative planning
• deliberative planning
• institutional trust and mistrust
• civic vigilance

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Following Hodgson (2006, p. 18), we define institutions broadly, as “systems of established and embedded social rules that structure social interactions”, and organisations as a specific type of institution.

2. Legally binding municipal zoning plans must be approved by the local council, before being ratified by the state.

3. Consultations included public hearings and guided walks, citizen working groups, and a questionnaire to about 30 000 households and businesses in central Gothenburg. Some 80% of the approximately 1500 responses received within a couple of weeks were favourable to the project (Banverket, 2006, p. 12). Between March and May 2015, about 80 citizens who had in the questionnaire expressed their interest participated in six working groups, each focusing on a specific topic suggested by the citizens. Also the major local and regional authorities and agencies were consulted.

4. https://atrewe.wordpress.com/2015/01/01/goteborgsandan-och-decemberoverenskommelsen/.

5. See e.g. http://folkinitiativet.se/vastlanken/ The recent debate on the impact of Västlänken on groundwater levels has a similar tone: opponents refer to Trafikverket’s own research and data to contest the project. http://www.gp.se/ledare/cwejman-v%C3%A4stl%C3%A4nken-%C3%A4r-en-koloss-p%C3%A5-lerf%C3%B6tter-1.4725632; http://stoppavastlanken.nu/trafikverket-ger-sig-pa-cwejman/; http://stoppavastlanken.nu/hur-trafikverk-motiverar-vastlanken-och-varfor-det-inte-stammer/.

6. An interviewed opponent politician indeed claimed that Sweden was the only Nordic country in which a project can legally go ahead despite its negative cost-benefit ratio.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the partners of the CONNECT Centre: Fondation de France, SNCF réseau, Electricité de France, and Institut Caisse des Dépôts pour la Recherche.

Notes on contributors

Markku Lehtonen

Dr Markku Lehtonen is associate researcher at the CONNECT (CONsultation, Negotiation, Environment, Conception and Territories) Centre, ESSEC Business School, Cergy-Pontoise, France. (Since February 2019, Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant holder at the University Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona). His research areas include deliberative democracy and public participation in environment-related policymaking, role of expertise in environmental and energy policies, as well as governance and controversies in energy policy.

Laurence De Carlo

Dr Laurence de Carlo is professor at the Public and Private Policy Department at the ESSEC Business school, Cergy-Pontoise, France, and chairholder of the CONNECT Centre. Her teaching and research concentrate on public consultation, negotiation and facilitation in planning. She has also broad experience of participatory governance practice, including through her experience as “guarantor of participation”, appointed by the French National Commission for Public Debate, in a conflict-ridden railway project in the Paris region.