NCJ Number
104497
Date Published
1987
Length
60 pages
Annotation
Procedural justice was examined in telephone interview data for 652 Chicago residents who had had personal experience with the police and courts in the preceding year (1983-1984).
Abstract
Attention was focused on the effects of procedural justice on citizen satisfaction with outcomes, evaluations of legal authorities, and the meanings attributed to fair process. Results replicate the findings of past research showing that procedural justice has a major impact on both satisfaction and evaluations. They also suggest that procedural justice judgments are complex and multifaceted. Seven issues were found to make independent contributions to citizen judgments about whether legal authorities acted justly: perceptions of the degree to which authorities were motivated to be fair and how they conducted themselves ethically, perceived honesty of authorities, the extent of opportunities for representation, the quality of the decision made, opportunities for error correction, and whether authorities behaved in a biased fashion. The meaning of procedural justice varied depending on the nature of the situation, but not depending on the characteristics of the involved individuals. Results suggest that the meaning of procedural justice is situational in nature. Consequently, it is likely that there are no universally fair procedures for allocation and dispute resolution: different procedures are appropriate to different circumstances. 5 notes, 6 tables, and 67 references. (Author abstract modified)