Over the past decade, Food Policy Groups (FPGs)—including Food Policy Councils and Food Partnerships—have proliferated as participatory spaces where diverse actors collectively address food system challenges. Celebrated for their inclusive and democratic potential, FPGs are now at the forefront of transforming food system governance. Yet critical scholarship reveals persistent gaps between participatory rhetoric and practice, showing how these structures can maintain power imbalances, enable elite capture and produce superficial involvement rather than genuine influence. Addressing this gap requires attention to procedural justice—the fairness of participatory processes themselves, including who is included, how decisions are made and whether participation is meaningful. This in turn raises a fundamental question: How is procedural justice pursued and experienced in participatory food system governance? This thesis addresses this question through three studies—and what this reveals about the conditions under which participatory mechanisms can make food system governance more genuinely just and democratic.

Drawing on a comparative analysis of 25 FPGs across the United States and the United Kingdom, alongside an in-depth case study of member perceptions in two government-hosted FPGs, the research reveals that procedural justice is shaped by the dynamic interplay between participants, organisational design and the relational practices through which governance unfolds. The findings suggests that the relationship between how justice is pursued and how it is experienced is mediated by practice—by the everyday dynamics of facilitation, trust and temporality that determine whether formal commitments are realised or undermined. Overall, the thesis points toward a fundamental reorientation: realising procedural justice demands not better structures but different practices. Building on these empirical insights, the thesis develops an integrated analytical framework identifying three dimensions—participants, structural design and discourses—that shape procedural justice in participatory food system governance. Overall, the thesis advances understanding of how procedural injustices may be reproduced within participatory spaces while offering pathways toward more genuinely just, inclusive and democratic food system governance.