Collective voice and support for social protest among Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians: Considering the role of procedural fairness in an intergroup conflict of interest

Although traditional procedural fairness research examines interpersonal conflicts within groups, there is a dearth of such research examining intergroup conflicts of interest. The current experiment sought to rectify this discrepancy by measuring Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians' responses to a hypothetical scenario regarding discussions over Native Title rights. Each group's collective representation (“voice”), and the group membership of an arbitrating authority were independently manipulated. Members of both samples agreed that Indigenous voice only was fairer than non-Indigenous voice only. Moreover, Indigenous participants reported greater protest support following non-Indigenous voice only than Indigenous voice only, and the greatest acceptance of potential outcomes under conditions of Indigenous voice provided by an Indigenous authority. Non-Indigenous participants, however, reported the highest level of protest support following non-Indigenous voice provided by a non-Indigenous authority, and the lowest level of protest following Indigenous voice provided by the same non-Indigenous authority. Only some of these results are consistent with predictions, and thus highlight how analyses of procedural fairness must consider the broader historical and political context in which the procedures are unfolding.