A missing link between citizen participation, satisfaction, and public performance: evidences from the city and county of San Francisco

Abstract

While current literature has consistently examined the causal relationship between public performance and citizen satisfaction as well as citizen participation and citizen satisfaction, few have investigated latent paths among three variables: performance, participation, and satisfaction of citizens. This study identifies the associations between public performance, citizen participation, and citizen satisfaction by using a structural equation modelling. This study utilises the annual citizen survey of San Francisco to test four hypotheses as latent paths derived from public performance, citizen participation, and citizen satisfaction. The citizen survey allows us to identify the missing link between citizen participation, public performance and perceived citizen satisfaction. The analysis results show that the high level of citizen participation is positively associated with citizen satisfaction, but the relationship between the participation and satisfaction is significantly mediated by perceived public performance. The findings highlight that active citizen participation can hold public administrators accountable for performance, and also the perceived public performance is positively associated with citizen satisfaction. More importantly, the positive relationship between citizen participation and satisfaction is mediated by the perceived assessment of respondents on public performance of municipal services.