Established frameworks for social impact assessment (SIA), both internationally and in Australia, emphasise the fundamental need for rigorous social-science methods, alongside complementary principles such as impartiality, a life-cycle approach, and transparency. For example, the New South Wales (NSW) SIA guideline for resource projects (NSW DPE, 2017) notes that SIA should use appropriate, accepted social-science methods and robust evidence from authoritative sources, and that SIA should be undertaken in a fair, unbiased manner.The rationale for these principles is that decision-makers, and people potentially affected by major projects, should be able to rely on the findings and conclusions in forming a balanced view of their merits. On this basis, rigorously investigating the communitys views, and level of approval or social licence for a proposal becomes one of the critically important parts in the SIA process. After all, canvassing the views of potentially-affected people is one of the key ways to understand how they expect the project to affect them. CITATION:Parsons, R, Lawrence, R, Luke, H and Vozoff, J, 2019. Social licence or social science? Perspectives on social impact assessment, in Proceedings 9th International Conference on Sustainable Development in the Minerals Industry, pp 143144 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).