Extending Procedural Justice Theory to the Chinese Context: The Role of Collective Efficacy

Recognizing that prior research has paid limited attention to the relevance of neighbourhood context to the procedural justice model of regulation, this study, based on data collected from a recent survey of 2,245 residents in a southeast city in China, examined the relationship between procedural fairness, collective efficacy and citizens’ willingness to cooperate with the police, with a special focus on the role of collective efficacy in the function of the procedural justice theoretical framework. The results of this study revealed that the association between perceived collective efficacy and willingness to cooperate with the police was stronger than that between procedural fairness and the outcome variable. Additionally, this study demonstrated a moderating role of perceived collective efficacy on the relationship between procedural fairness and cooperation (the link between procedural fairness and cooperation was stronger for those with a low level of perceived collective efficacy), further highlighting the relevance of citizens’ perceptions of neighbourhood context to their attitudinal behaviours towards the police. These findings have important implications for the direction of efforts to foster citizens’ support and cooperation.