Analysis of Indicators of Legality, Legitimacy and Legitimation in Public Policy: An Example of REDD+ in Mexico

HIGHLIGHTS Forest governance schemes should incorporate the principles of legality, legitimacy, and legitimation. The principle of legality arises from the existence of a legal framework in force. The principle of legitimacy is born from social recognition. The principle of legitimation can be understood from the desired effect of both the law and social recognition. Normative, sociological and institutional indicators can be identified that allow understanding of the legitimacy. SUMMARY At the international level, the REDD+ mechanism has been promoted through public policies and financial incentives to improve forest conditions and reduce climate change. Given the dynamics of deforestation and forest degradation in Mexico, REDD+ has been implemented as a strategy that can be analyzed under indicators of legality, legitimacy and legitimation to understand its acceptance in the community and the achievement of the effects of policies planned, formulated, implemented and evaluated as forest governance schemes. The objective of this study is to identify in the scientific literature the main indicators of legality, legitimacy and legitimation in public policies and to propose a framework for analyzing forest governance in Mexico, using REDD+ as an example of an emerging international public policy. To achieve an approach to legality, legitimacy and legitimation, an exploration, review and description of various studies that have identified these indicators has been carried out. Some of the studies are associated with forest governance schemes and propose models to determine their presence in government actions, public policies and forestry legislation. The main findings suggest that the construction of normative, sociological and institutional indicators, mainly for forest legitimacy, as well as the knowledge of the normativity (legality) and the effect caused (legitimation) must be understood in an interrelated way, even though, in the literature, some authors identify legitimacy as synonymous with legitimation.