Investigation as legitimacy: the maturing of the big public inquiry

All major resource development schemes lie embedded in political prejudices and commitments, in interest group expectations which themselves are influenced by past events, and in the changing atmosphere of public priorities. A proposal to develop a new technology, which, especially if successful, would lead to further investments of a similar nature but which would by necessity restrict the scope for other opportunities in other policy areas, is bound to be controversial. The inevitable demand is for full justification through some kind of reputable open examination whose conduct and outcome are deemed to be fair and legitimate. While the form of that examination will vary from country to country its function remains the same — namely, to mobilise public support for a decision and the policies that envelop it. In the U.K. the public inquiry seeks to serve such a function. Its constitutional role, history, contemporary style and emerging problems of legitimacy are all examined with reference to the Sizewell B Inquiry into Britain's first pressurised water reactor.