What Are the Political Consequences of Trust?

Abstract

Trust in political institutions and in other people is hypothesized by cultural theories to be essential for making democracies work. Trust is equated with diffuse support and linked to the stability and effective functioning of democratic regimes. Institutional theories, in contrast, question the importance of trust for democratic support and emphasize institutional performance instead. A structural equation model using New Russia Barometer survey data tests cultural and institutional theories of regime support. The results confirm cultural arguments that institutional trust encourages political involvement and contributes to public support for democratic ideals, whereas they contradict the hypothesis that trust is critical for political support. Much stronger support exists for institutional theory's claims about the importance of economic and political performance. Cultural influences, however, appear somewhat larger than institutional theories allow and may become larger still during the longer term, suggesting the need to integrate cultural and institutional theories.

The Impact of Citizen Satisfaction with Government Performance on Public Trust in the Government: Empirical Evidence from Urban Yemen

“…Trust is fundamentally important for a healthy and functioning democracy [14]. It engenders citizen compliance with public policies, encourages political participation, and contributes to perceptions of governmental legitimacy [15].…”

Causas y permanencia de la corrupción, el rol de la confianza y los dilemas sociales: el caso de Ecuador

“…Finally, recalling Rose and Mishler (2005) work on the political consequences of trust, it is clear that interpersonal trust, especially when associated with trust in institutions-as is the case with Ecuador-not only affects the perception of corruption. This lack of trust has the power of affecting the functioning of society on many different levels, including social, economic, and political relations.…”

“…Using a cross-national assessment of 46 countries, Do Hwang (2015) found out that institutional and interpersonal trust are linked, but he remained sceptical on the direction of this relation. Rose and Mishler(2005) argued that "institutional trust encourages political involvement and contributes to public support of democratic ideals". However, they pointed out that cultural explanations focused on interpersonal trust seem to be more influential in the long run.…”

Institutions, crises, and political confidence in seven contemporary democracies. An elite–mass analysis

“…(Almond & Verba, ; Eckstein, , 1998; Cleary & Stokes, ; Booth & Seligson, ; Gilley, ; Inglehart, ). It can therefore be argued that democracy becomes stable and consolidated when citizen demands and institutional provision of democracy are balanced (Dalton & Shin, ; Grindle, ; Inglehart & Welzel, ; Mattes & Bratton, ; Rose et al, ; Mishler & Richard, ; Welzel & Klingemann, ). In addition, there is also a longstanding debate about the impact of economic performance on political confidence with a varied range of outcomes that we should take note of.…”

“…Taking a substantial body of literature on democratisation into account, we should also keep in mind that economic development, linked with urbanization, growth of gross domestic product (GDP), rising living standards, and the like would enhance people's political expectations of the government towards greater accountability, transparency, and democracy (Lipset, ). Similarly, the opposite trend, such as economic recession and its effects (for instance, a decline in income), increases the probability of regime failure, especially for democracies (Przeworski et al, ; Diamond, ; Evans & Whitefield, ; Mishler & Richard, ; Pacek & Radcliff, ; Reich, ; Shin & McDonough, ). Actually, “[a]long with the studies of the importance of objective economic factors on democratic aspirations stated above, no less influential are a large body of literature on economic voting in which the importance of subjective economic evaluations on the satisfaction with and support for democracy is unravelled.” (Lam, : 215).…”