If they get it right: An experimental test of the effects of the appointment and reports of UK public inquiries

A number of arguments regarding the politics of UK public inquiries (PIs) suggest that the appointment of a public inquiry and its subsequent report affect public responsibility attributions in ways that could be beneficial to the appointing office holder. One claim refers to the effect of an appointment on responsibility attribution towards the appointer of a PI; another refers to the relative strength of the effects of PI reports on responsibility attributions compared with other public evaluations. This latter argument relies on the assumption that PIs are judged as more credible than other conveyors of public evaluations. To test these hypotheses, this research employs two web-based experiments involving a sample of 474 UK citizens. The findings do not support the hypotheses. Instead, they reveal that the credibility of PIs is conditional upon acceptability of the report content.