Free fall or soft landing? The (un)wanted effects of flawed political uptake and the mitigating potential of justification & post-decision voice

Democratic innovations are nowadays more frequently resorted to by (local) governments to develop and implement more responsive and supported policies with the additional hope of closing the apparent rift between politics and citizens. The proliferation of subsequent deliberative and plebiscitary arrangements raised questions on their actual impact on policy and changes in perceptions among citizens in the population. Such effects might be affected by factors in various phases of the decision-making process. Building on recent empirical insights this paper adopts a three-phase model of decision-making. It addresses if and how (1) the nature of the participatory arrangement (pre-decision), (2) the absence of or partial political uptake (decision) and (3) the provision of different forms of justification by politicians (post-decision) drive the (un)wanted effects on citizens in the public at large. More specifically, we examine effects for political trust, external political efficacy and support for participatory decision-making. First, we consider if and how plebiscitary and deliberative arrangements might differ in shaping effects. Both entail different degrees of inclusion and (the rejection of) citizens’ input by politicians might be perceived differently by citizens in both cases. Previous studies focused on one specific or two sequenced arrangements. The current study includes a deliberative mini-public and a consultative referendum comparing both and vis-à-vis the representative decision-making process. Second, it has been argued that in practice participation produces rather limited impact for citizens, implying a final decision-making mandate for elected officials. In this decision-making phase, political actors might engage in cherry-picking or reject proposals by citizens. This sets the stage for generating unwanted effects that further exacerbate political trust and external political efficacy. Recent work underlines the potential fallout in terms of political support among citizens when political uptake of proposals by a mini-public is absent (Van Dijk & Lefevere, 2022). The question remains if such a finding differs at local level, is applicable to other political attitudes and is equally supported in other arrangements. Third, we explore if and how (un)wanted effects could be mitigated after a decision. One of the answers could lie in the role of justification of the decision (Fernandez-Martinez et al., 2023) or post-decision arrangements. Only recently scholars have shown how different forms of outreach by politicians after a decision could impact legitimacy (De Fine Licht et al., 2022). We aim to determine what the effect is when a substantive explanation is given and how this differs from the scenario where there is no form of justification or when citizens are given an additional opportunity to voice concerns. In doing so, we can determine how side-effects of (partial) rejection can be mitigated. Through a vignette experiment, we expose two groups of citizens (n = 1000) to similar scenarios at the local level regarding one policy issue that depicts the three aforementioned phases. With this paper we hope to further the literature on macropolitical effects of participation and understand the role of justification in mitigating unwanted effects.