Legitimacy of site selection processes across Europe: Social construction of legitimacy in three European countries
OA Location
Author(s)
Cent, Joanna
Grodzińska-Jurczak, Małgorzata
Pietrzyk-Kaszyńska, Agata
Paloniemi, iikka
Apostolopoulou, Evangelia
Type
Chapter
Abstract
Legitimacy is an important element of governance processes affecting the overall institutional effectiveness (Biermann et al. 2009). In biodiversity governance and protected areas management, legitimacy is highlighted as one of the most important issues that enable proper conservation measures (Stern 2008). However, it can be either gained or compromised through the environmental decision making processes (see Brechin et al. 2002, Smith and McDonough 2001). Legitimacy relates to the whole spectrum of outcomes of decision-making processes and to their procedural aspects. Whether or not the process and its results are considered legitimate relies on numerous factors, starting from the accordance with legal basis, through the facts of who makes the decision and when and how the decision is made. Thus, legitimacy depends on the extent to which a decision is acceptable to the participants of the process (Adger et al. 2003), who is involved as a participant and how representative participants are for the actual stakeholders groups (Green 2010). It also involves the acceptance or the acknowledgement of suitable power to a certain decision-making authority (social approval of using power) (Wallington et al. 2008), which in turn requires an assumption of the desirable and proper action of this entity (Schlossberg and Shuford 2005).
Editor(s)
Henle, Klaus
Potts, Simon
Kunin, William
Matsinos, Yiannis
Simila, Jukka
Pantis, John
Grobelnik, Vesna
Penev, Lyubomir
Settele, Josef
Date Issued
2014-07-30
Citation
Scaling in Ecology and Biodiversity Conservation., 2014, pp.180-185
ISBN
978-954-642-739-7
Publisher
Pensoft Publishers
Start Page
180
End Page
185
Journal / Book Title
Scaling in Ecology and Biodiversity Conservation.
Publication Status
Published
Date Publish Online
2014-07-28