Social Licence for Infrastructure Model

I2S PhD Candidate and Research Officer Sabit Otor's new paper with I2S Director Professor Sara Bice and ARC Industry Fellow Dr Hayley Henderson introduces the Social Licence for Infrastructure Model. Get the highlights, below, or dig into the data and read the full paper here: 
'Social Licence to Operate and Major Infrastructure: A Social Exchange Theory Approach to Modelling Drivers of Community Acceptance', S. Otor, S. Bice and H. Henderson (2026), Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management 0:1, pp.1-22.

Social Licence for major infrastructure projects is widely talked about but surprisingly little-researched.

Our brand new study looks at how social licence for infrastructure is distinctive to the major industries of much SLO research, mining and extractives. Findings show that the benefits and risks community members perceive as being related to major projects make a big difference.

We've also taken a fresh look at the role of trust in SLO. The results may surprise you! In SLO models for mining and extractives, trust usually comes towards the end of the SLO pathway. But we found that trust needs to be positioned much earlier on the SLO pathway, at least for major linear infrastructure (e.g., roads, rail, water pipes, power lines). Trust comes before the perceived risks and benefits of a project. It impacts the ways community members judge a project, making it more of an input than an outcome.

What's the takeaway? Organisations and governments delivering major infrastructure need to focus on building trusting relationships with local communities very early in the project lifecycle. Where many projects are being delivered in one area, levels of trust in relationships will inform the next project's SLO.

The SLO for Infrastructure Model also introduces four new factors that drive community acceptance of major infrastructure: accountability, community engagement, impact importance, and amount of development in the local area. Importantly, 'impact importance' is how important community members judge the impact of a project on the things they value. 'Amount of development' accounts for the cumulative impacts we often talk about at Crawford School of Public Policy I2S Next Generation Engagement. 

💐 Huge thank you to all of the I2S Team, theAustralian Research Council (ARC)for Linkage funding (LP210200697), our Industry Partners for continued support and toDr Kieren Moffat,Naomi BoughenandSean Murphyfor their collaboration in the survey that supported this modelling. And to Kieren andAirong Zhang, whose work on modelling SLO set the standard.