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私としては、多数決で決めることに賛成です。 in this sentence why did we use に particle before 賛成です. is 賛成 here working as a noun or adjective ?

Eiríkr Útlendi
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Sam
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2 Answers2

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This 賛成 is a noun known as a no-adjective. A no-adjective is a noun that translates to an English adjective. Unlike ordinary nouns, no-adjectives and na-adjectives can be modified by adverbs (e.g., やや, かなり, とても) and adverbial expressions, which includes ～に.

Similar examples:

  • この曲は若者に人気です。
    This song is popular among young people.
  • 若者に人気の曲
    a song that is popular among young people
  • この風習は日本に特有です。
    This custom is unique to Japan.
  • これは日本に特有の風習です。
    This is a custom that is unique to Japan.

賛成 also works as a plain (suru-)verb:

  • 多数決で決めることに賛成します。
naruto
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  • Minor quibble: I'm not familiar with any sort of adjectival usage for 賛成【さんせい】. All monolingual Japanese resources that I have access to describe most other の adjectives like 本当【ほんとう】 as 形動【けいどう】, short for 形容動詞【けいようどうし】, the formal name for な and many の adjectives. Meanwhile, 賛成 is listed as （名）スル, that is, a 名詞【めいし】 or noun that can also be used as a する verb, a category which also includes things like 勉強【べんきょう】 or 料理【りょうり】. (Including extra detail for other readers. :) ) – Eiríkr Útlendi Jul 17 '19 at 19:07
  • @EiríkrÚtlendi You can say その意見に賛成の人 (or sometimes even 意見に賛成な人). While you can also say その意見への賛成を得る, I don't know why 賛成 can be directly modified by ～に if it's just an ordinary noun. – naruto Jul 17 '19 at 19:16
  • 拒否【きょひ】, 屈服【くっぷく】, 意義【いぎ】, 同意【どうい】, etc. all seem to work similarly to 賛成【さんせい】: the "something" noun is marked by に, and the verbal noun can then take either だ・です or some variant of する. I don't think these other words are adjectives either, but perhaps there's a native-speaker perspective that I'm missing...? – Eiríkr Útlendi Jul 17 '19 at 22:46
  • @EiríkrÚtlendi 同意 is indeed similar to 賛成 in that you can say both 彼に同意です and 彼に同意の人. I doubt the other three are similar to 賛成 (×彼に拒否だ, ×彼に屈服の人, ...). – naruto Jul 18 '19 at 01:57
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Adding on to naruto's post, think about the meaning of 賛成: "agreement". As a noun, it can be used in the sense of "agreement to / with something". As a verb with する, it becomes "to agree to / with something". Much like the how the English terms "agreement" and "agree" are used, where one agrees or is in agreement to or with something, the Japanese requires a に to mark the "something" that serves as the indirect object of this verbal noun or verb construction.

Let's look again at your sample sentence.

私【わたし】としては、多【た】数【すう】決【けつ】で決【き】めること​[に]【●】​賛【さん】成【せい】です。

Here's one possible translation.

As for me, I am in agreement [with]{●●●●} deciding by majority vote.

Note the parallel between the に in Japanese and the with in the English. More natural phrasing in English might say something like,

For my part, I agree [that]{●●●●} we should decide by majority vote

... in which case the に would align with the that.

Eiríkr Útlendi
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