Trust in a Pandemic: Save Cannot Be Changed. What Does the Region Feel?

Abstract

Trust as a system-forming factor of social relations during crisis situations is tested for strength. This was most pronounced when studying the state of trust in the context of the coronavirus pandemic, which has engulfed almost the entire planet. The article examines the situation with trust, using the example of a regional community. The source of empirical data was the results of several surveys of the population of the Vologda Oblast conducted by researchers of the VolRC RAS for the period from2016 to 2020. in the course of the implementation of scientific projects on grants from the RFBR The data obtained on the basis of comparable methods in the period before the pandemic and at the end of its second wave are analyzed. The purpose of the article is to carry out a comparative analysis of the available statistical data and to identify the changes that have occurred in the level and structure of trust in the region’s population. The paper concludes that in the context of a pandemic, the existing level of generalized trust, the existing structure and its radius have generally remained. At the same time, certain changes were revealed in the sphere of abstract trust or, to use the terminology of E. Giddens, trust in “anonymous others”. The changes concerned primarily the priorities in choosing the addressees of trust. The observed changes reflected the pain points of society during the crisis. Trust in doctors and teachers, expert scientists has fallen. The sharp decline in the level of trust in them can be seen as a kind of expression of protest against the difficult situation in education and health care, which has developed as a result of the pandemic and self-isolation. Trust in government institutions remains stable, which to a certain extent symbolize the stability of social structures and take responsibility in the current situation.