2022 Volume 61 Issue 2 Pages 57-70
The superior legitimization of a concerned party is defined as the tendency of people to consider that concerned parties (e.g., local residents) have superior rights to other actors (e.g., administrations) to decide the locations of public facilities and is associated with the NIMBY problem. It undermines total social benefits by inducing concerned parties to reject NIMBY facilities. The maximin principle and moral judgments are hypothesized to determine this tendency. An experiment using a vignette regarding a high-level radioactive waste storage facility was conducted in a 2×2 design; namely, group (in- vs. out-group) × concerned party (statistical vs. identifiable lives). The superior legitimization of the concerned party was indicated not only in the in-group, but also in the out-group, among whom the maximin principle was not aroused. It was more salient in the in-group when an identified life was presented as the concerned party. The path from the individualizing moral foundation toward the legitimacy of the concerned party was notable in the in-group. Moral studies of NIMBY problems can be expected to result in further theoretical development.
