A Comparative Study of Community Response to Infrastructure 'Siting Decisions'

50年前，大型基础设施项目面临的主要挑战是技术或科学。如今，此类项目面临的最大障碍几乎总是社会和/或政治方面的，它们的启动往往会引发公众的强烈反对。然而，公众的反对并不总是发生。为什么?该项目由科学与社会和社会学项目资助，对2004年以来美国30个选址决策的社区反应进行了系统的比较分析。该分析确定了影响公众对大型基础设施项目反对的因素和动态过程。该项目的智力价值包括在科学、技术与社会和社会学方面贡献了三套研究文献。这些研究包括：关于社会运动的研究，关于“邻避”态度的决定因素的研究，以及关于公众参与与设施选址之间联系的研究。通过关注对选址决策的反应，而不是对运动的反应，该项目避免了在运动文献中选择因变量的常见趋势。我们可以从公众反对很少的情况中学到很多东西，就像从反对强烈的情况中学到很多东西一样。该项目还探讨了运动动员与技术因素之间的联系，后者在社会运动研究中经常被忽视。最后，通过使用Charles Ragin的定性比较分析方法，本研究将案例研究的丰富性与“大N”研究的推断可能性结合起来。该项目在研究生和本科生参与研究过程中具有更广泛的影响。它还为与基础设施选址相关的决策提供了见解，并为参与此类未来冲突的利益相关者提供了见解。由于该国的基础设施需求不断增长，本研究提供了有关这些项目的哪些特征会引起社区反对以及哪些程序有助于减轻公民担忧的知识。

Fifty years ago the main challenges to large infrastructure projects were technical or scientific. Today, the greatest hurdles faced by such projects are almost always social and/or political, with their onset often triggering intense public opposition. However, public opposition does not always occur. Why? This project funded by the Science and Society and Sociology programs undertakes a systematic comparative analysis of community response to 30 siting decisions in the United States since 2004. The analysis identifies the factors and dynamic processes that shape variation in popular opposition to large infrastructure projects.The intellectual merits of the project include contributions to three sets of research literature in science, technology & society and sociology. These include: research on social movements, research on the determinants of not-in-my-back-yard (NIMBY) attitudes, and research on the link between public participation and facility siting. By focusing on responses to siting decisions rather than movements, the project avoids the common tendency of selecting on the dependent variable in movement literature. Much can be learned from cases where little public opposition occurs just as it can from cases where opposition is strong. The project also explores the link between movement mobilization and technical factors, the latter of which are often ignored in social movement research. Finally, through the use of Charles Ragin's method of Qualitative Comparative Analysis, the study combines the richness of case studies with the inferential possibilities of "large N" studies.The project has broader impacts in its involvement of graduate and undergraduate students in the research process. It also provides insights for policy-making related to infrastructure siting, and for stakeholders involved in such future conflicts. Since the country's infrastructure needs are growing, this research provides knowledge about what features of these projects stimulate community opposition and what procedures help to mitigate citizen concerns.