Institutional trust and the provision of public goods: When do individual costs matter? The case of recycling

Abstract

This research asks whether and how institutional trust—trust in the reliability, effectiveness, and legitimacy of public institutions—promotes the provision of public goods. To understand the underlying mechanisms, we apply three choice models to the example of recycling behavior: a standard rational choice model, the low-cost hypothesis, and a dual-process theory. The models carry competing hypotheses about the interplay of trust and incentives in recycling behavior. Using survey data collected in four countries (Sweden, Denmark, the United States, and the United Kingdom), we find a positive and significant interaction effect of institutional trust and recycling costs on self-reported recycling behavior. No such interaction was found using generalized social trust as a second measure of trust. Our results support a dual-process perspective and indicate that high levels of institutional trust can suppress the inhibiting effect of individual costs on cooperation in a collective action dilemma.