Participation, Perception of Participation, and Citizen Support

Despite strong support for citizen participation in the abstract, there is less support in practice, in part because of different expectations about the impact of participation. This research examines participation in two communities following a disaster. It tests four hypotheses. The research demonstrates that actual participation had no impact or a slight negative impact on satisfaction and legitimacy, but the beliefs that citizens had had an impact and the city had attempted to involve citizens were strongly positively related to both. The research suggests that the symbolic role of participation may be more important than its instrumental role.