Social Capital and Trust in a Biomass Plant Planning Consultation. Philip Sinclair, Centre for Environmental Strategy, University of Surrey, Guildford, GU2 5XH, UK, e-mail p.sinclair@surrey.ac.uk
This paper outlines findings from interviews and questionnaire research carried out in Sutton, Cambridgeshire, UK, in May 1998, where a planning consultation for a biomass (straw burning) plant took place between January 1994 and February 1996. A measure of social capital, based on membership of voluntary associations, was constructed, and discriminant functions were derived from the social capital measure, education level and age, to fit replies to questions relating to trust in five parties in the planning debate (the developer, the local planning authority, the parish council, the local media and environmental groups). Respondents’ trust in these five parties was also related to issues such as perceived fairness, risk communication, public participation and social amplification. It was found that while the measure of social capital used may be a good predictor of agreement with the statement “most people can be trusted”, it is not such a good predictor of trust in the specific parties. The usefulness of the social capital concept for predicting trust behaviour in such planning debates is then assessed.
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