Blame avoidance of street-level bureaucrats in 5G NIMBY crisis decision making: Evidence from a list experiment

In a crisis situation, accountability and discretion are associated with the blame avoidance behavior of street-level bureaucrats. However, whether and how blame avoidance occurs in decision making in a crisis situation remain underexamined, partially because measuring blame avoidance is challenging owing to social desirability. This study examines how two crisis dimensions (i.e., threat and urgency) influence the blame avoidance behavior of street-level bureaucrats in 5G NIMBY crisis. Based on a list experiment, results show the following: (1) in the normal condition, street-level bureaucrats do not avoid blame even when given the option; (2) street-level bureaucrats become risk averse in the urgency, threat, and crisis conditions and are more sensitive to threat than to urgency; (3) risk perception is positively associated with blame avoidance, and compared with the normal condition, risk perception mediates 64.48% and 83.74% of the relation between the threat and crisis conditions and blame avoidance, respectively; and public service motivation (PSM) is negatively associated with blame avoidance and moderates the relation between risk perception and blame avoidance. In practice, emphasis should be placed on the cultivation of PSM. Moreover, an accountability system that can reduce the perceived risk of street-level bureaucrats of the consequences of decision making in urgency and threat conditions should be established.