Legal and Ethical Citizenship in Citizen Science

Abstract

Citizen science in research is framed as a democratic form of public participation. There is a lack of scientific research in public administration literature that focus on how participation in citizen science is structured through legal and ethical expectations and how it shapes legitimacy. Two main questions are asked in this article: 1) How legal and ethical dimensions of citizenship structure participation in citizen science? and 2) What legitimacy risks emerge when legal protections and ethical expectations are misaligned? Using a conceptual research design based on theory and normative analysis, the article focuses on illustrative selection of interdisciplinary citizen science governance, deliberative democratic theory and normative approaches to citizenship in public administration. An analytical framework is developed that distinguishes legal and ethical citizenship and legitimacy as participatory dimensions. Results show how legal protection can generate procedural compliance, but if ethical expectations are left aside, the risk of participation without influence, moral asymmetry and legitimacy gaps arise.