Can transparency promote citizen compliance in China? The role of justice and social identification

Abstract

Although public administration has advocated transparency for achieving citizen compliance, mixed results suggest that the mechanisms behind transparency need further clarification. In this paper, it is examined how transparency promotes citizen compliance in the Chinese context using urban renewal as example and data from interviews and a questionnaire survey. The results show that government transparency can enhance citizen compliance by promoting perceived justice. However, the positive effect of transparency on citizen compliance through justice is only significant in conditions of low social identification. Specifically, the effect of perceived justice decreases with increasing social identification, ultimately leading to a diminished effect of transparency. This study contributes conditional evidence regarding the role of transparency in promoting citizen compliance, which has practical implications for public administration.