Modeling of public trust in basic social and political institutions: A comparative econometric analysis (original) (raw)
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Type of Trust and Political Participation in Five Countries: Results of Social Quality Survey
Development and Society, 2013
NatioNal uNiverSity jaeyeol yee | Seoul NatioNal uNiverSity Dukjin CHang | Seoul NatioNal uNiverSity This article classifies types of trust by combining general trust, interpersonal trust, and institutional trust based on the hypothesis that individuals have different types of trust. The results of this article show different shapes of types of trust distribution in South Korea, Germany, Italy, Greece, and Turkey. Also, multinomial logit analysis reveals that each type of trust is influenced by certain conditions. Four types (△distrust, △institution-oriented trust, △person-oriented trust, and △full trust) are drawn from latent class analysis. Age, monthly income, network, financial crisis experience, and participation in private association are proven to have a critical impact on types of trust. Analysis shows that South Korea, Germany, Italy, Greece, and Turkey have different distribution of types of trust. Institution-oriented trust, personoriented trust, and full trust type respectively account for about 25% in Germany. Turkey has a relatively higher percentage of institution-oriented trust type. In contrast, distrust type accounts for more than two-thirds in South Korea, Italy, and Greece. Finally, logit analysis was conducted to figure out the role of types of trust in four kinds of political participation (△online expression, △expressing one's opinion toward governments or media, △participating in activities such as political campaigns, demonstrations, and strikes, and △voting) as dependent variables. The result shows that institution-oriented trust type people are more likely to participate in expressing their opinions toward governments or media and voting than distrust type. Also, personoriented trust type people are more likely to express their opinions toward governments or
PLoS ONE, 2012
Despite decades of research on social capital, studies that explore the relationship between political institutions and generalized trust-a key element of social capital-across time are sparse. To address this issue, we use various cross-national public-opinion data sets including the World Values Survey and employ pooled time-series OLS regression and fixed-and random-effects estimation techniques on an unbalanced panel of 74 countries and 248 observations spread over a 29-year time period. With these data and methods, we investigate the impact of five political-institutional factors-legal property rights, market regulations, labor market regulations, universality of socioeconomic provisions, and power-sharing capacityon generalized trust. We find that generalized trust increases monotonically with the quality of property rights institutions, that labor market regulations increase generalized trust, and that power-sharing capacity of the state decreases generalized trust. While generalized trust increases as the government regulation of credit, business, and economic markets decreases and as the universality of socioeconomic provisions increases, both effects appear to be more sensitive to the countries included and the modeling techniques employed than the other political-institutional factors. In short, we find that political institutions simultaneously promote and undermine generalized trust.
The Individual Bases of Political Trust: Trends in New and Established Democracies
International Journal of Public Opinion Research, 2006
The expansion of democracy in the world has been paradoxically accompanied by a decline of political trust. By looking at the trends in political trust in new and stable democracies over the last 20 years, and their possible determinants, we claim that an observable decline in trust reflects the post-honeymoon disillusionment rather than the emergence of a more critical citizenry. However, the first new democracies of the 'third wave' show a significant reemergence of political trust after democratic consolidation. Using data from the World Values Survey and the European Values Survey, we develop a multivariate model of political trust. Our findings indicate that political trust is positively related to well-being, social capital, democratic attitudes, political interest, and external efficacy, suggesting that trust responds to government performance. However, political trust is generally hindered by corruption permissiveness, political radicalism and postmaterialism. We identify differences by region and type of society in these relationships, and discuss the methodological problems inherent to the ambiguities in the concept of political trust.
Social Indicators Research, 2020
Trust is an essential element for effective social cohesion and a correct expression of the principles of representative democracy. In many countries of the Western world, we are witnessing the advance of anti-establishment political movements and a steady decline of trust in institutions. Crisis, perception of crisis, climate of opinion around it have an impact on political attitudes and diversified feelings (interest, trust, resentment), on political participation and on voting. Social analysts are called to deepen the reasons for the variability of these phenomena according to socio-cultural contexts and individual characteristics. The main aim of this paper is to analyse: 1) if and how much the spread of trust in institutions is different among the EU citizens and 2) what are the determinants of trust, deepening the intensity and the direction of the relationships with subjective and objective indicators. Our purpose is to outline the differences among the EU countries regarding trust in national and international institutions, simultaneously considering macro (country) and micro (individual) level of analysis by using a multilevel approach. The empirical analysis is based on the data collected by European Social Survey (ESS-Round 8) in 2016 (microdata) and on some variables (macrodata) taken from other statistical sources (Eurostat, Transparency International). The sample of individuals counts about 37 thousand subjects. Data analysis includes the construction of synthetic indices, using appropriate synthesis methods, and the identification of the determinants of Trust in Institutions, considering both micro and macro level explanatory variables, resorting to Multilevel Regression.
methods, data, analyses, 2018
Today, comparative social scientists have ample survey data to test the generalizability of theories related to political trust. Unless its measurement invariance has been established , they run the risk of drawing invalid conclusions though. Based on different sets of items and dimensional models, previous studies have yielded diverging results regarding the measurement invariance of political trust in Europe and former Soviet countries. Using a set of six items and contrasting three competing dimensional models, this study tests the measurement invariance of political trust across the globe in 32 electoral and liberal democracies. It uses multiple group confirmatory factor analysis and draws on data from the World Values Survey (wave 6, 2010-2014). Configural invariance of a revised two-dimensional model of trust in implementing and representative political institutions was established in 19 democracies when excluding trust in civil service. Full invariance of this model was established in three post-communist countries in eastern and southeastern Europe. The results corroborate that the measurement invariance of political trust must not be assumed. Conceptually, they provide reason to infer that, by and large, people in democracies have a two-dimensional construct of political trust. Methodologically, they manifest that trust in civil service is an ambiguous item, which is not as meaningfully related to the construct of political trust as other items.
Economic and other determinants of political trust
International Journal of Research In Business and Social Science, 2019
Political trust is important for the effective functioning of government. This paper uses cross country regression analysis to see whether three different measures of economic performance matter for political trust. The results lend support to the hypothesis that political trust is influenced by economic growth, the standard of living, and the appropriate use of government spending. In addition, the paper considers two institutional variables, perceived independence of the judiciary and the degree of democracy to assess their effect on political trust. It finds that perceived judicial independence has a positive effect on political trust, but democracy has a negative effect.
Article, 2019
The relationship between political and generalized trust has been placed in the centre of academic debate for several decades. Recent studies have found a positive link between the two constructs in democratic countries and Asian nondemocratic settings, but no correlation among them in post-communist countries. This paper extends the understanding of the link in nondemocratic settings by taking Vietnam as a case to investigate conditions behind the relationship. Using data of Vietnam from the fourth wave of Asian Barometer Survey, results of logistic regressions reveal that different types of trust in political institutions differently affect generalized trust. Trust in partisan institutions is positively associated with generalized trust, while there is no relationship between trust in checking institutions and generalized trust. Furthermore, partisanship and voluntary associational membership are demonstrated as two prominent conditions under which the variation of the link between trust in political institutions and generalized trust can be observed.
Modelling Political Trust in a Developing Country
Current Research Journal of Social Sciences, 2010
Jamaica is not atypical in its high levels of corruption, nor is it surprising that there is a low degree of public trusts in government -only 8 out of 100 people trust the government. One of the measures that can be used as an approximation for the public's distrust in government is the increasing decline in voting behaviour in elections, and the increase in unconventional political participation over the last half a decade. Within the context of the aforementioned issues, we will be examining the factors that account for this reality, as well as the extent of trust (or distrust) in the government and in interpersonal relationships in Jamaica from an econometric perspective. And so we will seek to build a model that explains the people's trust in government. This study utilizes primary observational data collected by the Centre of Leadership and Governance, Department of Government, the University of the West Indies at Mona, Kingston, Jamaica between July and August, 2006. The observational data was collected by way of a 166-item questionnaire. It was a stratified nationally representative sample of some 1,338 Jamaicans from all 14 parishes. The observational data were collected and stored using the Statistical Packages for the Social Sciences (SPSS) for Windows version 16.0. Descriptive statistics were done to provide background information on the sample, and tests were done for Cronbach alpha to examine the validity of the construct -i.e. wellbeing and political participation. Then, logistic regression was used to build a model. A goodness of fit statistics test was carried out on the model. Of a sampled population of 1,338 respondents, 37% (approximately 4 out of 10 persons) reported that they trust other persons compared to 8% (8 out of 100 people) who indicated that they trust the government. The observational data were used to test the general hypothesis [trust in government is a function of some 14 factors, and estimate the parameters of the final function. We found that of the 14 predisposed variables that were identified by the literature, only 6 were statistically significant influencers. The 6 factors explain 27.3% of the variance in trust in government. Those factors in regard to degree of importance in descending order are: confidence in socio-political institutions, governance of the country, interpersonal trust, political participation, administration of justice and sex of respondents. Governments in Jamaica have been suffering from a deficit in trust, just like the nation's budget And any building of trust in government must first begin by accepting the factors that affect trust, and secondly by being aware that their actions (or inactions) coupled with that of their related institutions affect public confidence, cooperation from the citizenry and civic engagement. Given the limitations of this study, we recommend that a longitudinal study be conducted with the same set of variables, as well as the others that were identified in the literature but were not used. And instead of using perceived corruption as a proxy for corruption, we utilized the operational definition of Transparency International, as corruption appears to be a primate variable in trust in government, but were unable to verify this with the use of perceived corruption.
Social Trust and Attitudes Toward Democracy
Public Opinion Quarterly, 2008
In spite of the great importance attached by social capital theory to the role of social trust in maintaining stable and effective democracy, research has produced rather weak and mixed support for the idea that the socially trusting individuals tend to be politically trusting, and the weight of evidence suggests either a weak or insignificant relationship between social and political trust. The present work, however, reports robust and statistically significant correlations between generalized social trust, on the one hand, and confidence in political institutions and satisfaction with democracy, on the other. The associations are significant in 23 European countries and in the United States. This article argues that its findings are more accurate and more reliable than much of the previous work because they are based on better and more sensitive measures. The results pose a dilemma for future survey work, while reopening possibilities for social capital research. Social Trust and Politics Social capital theory argues that generalized social trust is an important and central element in a complex and virtuous circle of social attitudes, behavior, and institutions that act as the foundation for stable and effective democratic government. Trust is said to sustain a cooperative social climate, to facilitate collective behavior, and to encourage a regard for the public interest. Trust
Trust in political institutions is considered to be of crucial importance for the stability of democratic political regimes, and as such the concept is widely used in empirical research. In this chapter I investigate the validity of the ‘institutional trust’-scale and present recent trends within institutional trust in Europe. The results are based on the four waves of the European Social Survey (ESS 2002, 2004, 2006, 2008).Trust in political institutions has been studied as a one-dimensional as well as a multidimensional concept. Using factor analysis, I investigate the validity of a one-factor measurement model of institutional trust. In a second part, I test the cross-cultural equivalence of institutional trust. Within comparative research institutional trust is studied extensively although it has not been investigated whether its meaning is the same across different countries and therefore whether it can be compared. In the last part of the chapter, I describe the trends in institutional trust and in satisfaction with government in Europe between 2002 and 2009.