Authoritarian Orientations and Political Trust in East Asian Societies

Abstract

In mainstream political science literature, two main theoretical perspectives on the origins of political trust predominate: institutional theory which argues that political trust is generated from democratic institutions and cultural theory which argues that political trust is rooted in historical-cultural factors such as social trust. However, the influence of other social values, such as authoritarian orientations, has received little attention in the extant literature. This article investigates the determinants of political trust in 13 East Asian societies with a special emphasis on authoritarian orientations. The evidence from our empirical study suggests that authoritarian orientations are an independent cultural source of political trust in these societies.