Decline Of Trust In Government Research Articles

Transparency and Trust in Government (2007–2014): A Comparative Study

AbstractThis article exposes contemporary approaches to transparency and trust. It explores the links between the two concepts in 10 countries between 2007 and 2014, using open-data indexes and access-to-information requests as proxies for transparency. So far, most studies have focused on conceptual models, specific aspects of transparency in particular case studies or have compared legal frameworks from different countries. Here, data about citizens’ requests to get access to administrative documents have been gathered. This dataset, combined with existing indexes on open data and government, has enabled us to establish a national ranking, particularly useful in a comparative perspective. Data about trust have been collected from reports published by international organisations. Key findings prove that there is no sharp decline of trust in government in all countries considered in this article. They also tend to show that transparency and trust in government are not systematically positively associated. Therefore, this article challenges the common assumption, mostly found in the normative literature, about a positive interrelation between the two, where trust in government is conceived as a beneficial effect of administrative transparency. Finally, it suggests that mis(trust) may be considered a key driver of transparency and would as such call for more transparency from public bodies.

American Politics: “Broken” Since 1885

Abstract:Woodrow Wilson, along with progressive intellectuals and reformers, bears significant responsibility for the decline of trust in government today. Wilson may have eclipsed James Madison in theory and practice, thereby contributing to the decline of trust in government. The criticism today of our politics as “dysfunctional” is, in large part, an echo of Wilson’s criticism of Madison’s Constitution. Today’s concerns about accountability, permanent politics, gridlock, special interests and petty partisanship reflect Wilson’s critique. In turn, Wilson has powerfully influenced the practice of our politics by providing the template for generations of political reformers. Today’s “dysfunction” is exacerbated by constitutionally inappropriate progressive reforms which have produced unintended consequences because reformers failed to appreciate Madison’s complex constitutional context. A century of progressive reforms have augmented dysfunction and distrust.

Conflict of Interest in Policing and the Public Sector

Conflicts of interest are a key factor in the contemporary decline of trust in government and public institutions, eroding public trust in government and democratic systems. Drawing on two unique empirical studies involving policing and the broader public sector, this paper explores the meaning and dimensions of conflict of interest by examining public complaints about conflict of interest and providing distinctive insights into the nature of conflict of interest as a problem for public sector ethics. The paper analyses and explores appropriate regulatory and management approaches for conflict of interest, focusing on three elements: (1) dealing with private interests that are identifiably problematic in the way they clash with the duties of public officials; (2) managing conflicts as they arise in the course of public sector work (manifested in preferential and adverse treatment, and other problematic areas); and (3) developing ethical and accountable organisational cultures. It is concluded that effective and meaningful public sector ethics in the pursuit of the public interest must be based on an ethos of social accountability and a commitment to prioritise the public interest in both fact and appearance.

California Constitutionalism: Trust in Government and Direct Democracy

This article provides a fresh perspective on direct democracy by focusing on its origins and persistence in California and by employing evidence from historical and social science research. My main thesis is that the origins and persistence of direct democracy has to do with the problem of trust in government. Focusing on the problem of trust establishes a new context for understanding direct democracy. In particular, I argue that the problems of direct democracy cannot be solved without confronting the equally serious problems citizens perceive with representative government. The two are twinned for all practical purposes. In order to show this, I retell in Part I the story of the adoption of direct democracy to highlight the difficult situation faced by California as a new state that featured the large-scale failure of the founders' eighteenth-century representative institutions to cope with the conditions present in late-nineteenth century America. In Part II, I first review the contemporary status of direct democracy in California in relation to the problem of trust in government. I then present a detailed historical explanation of the decline of trust in government in the U.S. by reviewing the most relevant social science evidence. The discussion shows that the problem of trust in government is a national problem extending back to the 1960s and that the use of direct democracy in California and other states will persist until the problems citizens have with representative government are acknowledged and addressed.

Corruption and the Disparty in Levels of Political Support by Winners and Losers

Abstract.Recent analyses of the determinants of levels of political support have stressed the role of institutions in producing the disparity in support by the winners and losers of an election. The authors claim that it is not only the countries' institutional structures that matter in determining this disparity but also how the institutions work. Specifically, they claim that the disparity between winners and losers is greater in countries with a high level of political corruption. They test this hypothesis in a cross-national sample from the European Social Survey Database.Résumé.Des analyses récentes des déterminants de l'appui politique ont souligné le rôle des institutions dans la dynamique de l'écart entre l'appui politique accordé aux vainqueurs et aux perdants d'une élection. Les auteurs avancent que la structure institutionelle du pays n'est pas l'unique variable d'importance pour expliquer l'écart entre vainqueurs et perdants, mais que le fonctionnement des institutions est aussi un facteur déterminant. Ils soutiennent plus précisément que l'écart entre vainqueurs et perdants sera plus grand dans les pays où la corruption est fortement ancrée dans les milieux politiques. Ils vérifient leur hypothèse à l'aide d'un échantillon de la base de données de l'enquête sociale européenne (European Social Survey).

Elections

Elections, John C. Courtney, Vancouver: UBC Press, 2004, pp. ix, 201.The expansion of the number of democratic regimes around the world and the decline of trust in government in established democracies have renewed interest in election laws and how these rules define the national community, allow citizens to express their preferences, and influence the composition of legislatures. In Canada, the study of electoral laws has frequently dealt with how electoral formulae translate votes into legislative representation.

Local Discourse and the Social Issues

election time, television ads mainly seek to frighten us, and when they are not drawing caricatures, they speak in slogans. Between elections, the authors of the scary television ads become managers of officeholders' public relations, bringing a new dimension to the term spin cycle. During the election, money talks: money for television time, for surveys and focus groups, for computer-targeted mailings, and above all, for the consultants who identify TV-worthy and tell the candidates what to say about them. After the election is over, money still talks: money to pay lobbyists; money to fly white hat witnesses (Girl Scouts, disabled veterans) to Washington to testify before congressional committees and before TV cameras on the Capitol steps; money to pay friendly think tanks for generating position papers calculated to clothe private greed in public-interest fig leaves.' In these circumstances, the recently lamented decline of trust in government does not seem mysterious. Cynicism, after all, begets cynicism. As politics increasingly comes to be seen as theater, no one should be surprised when the audience begins to drift away. Serious media discussions of public issues draw disappointing numbers of listeners,2 and citizens in huge proportions are not even bothering to vote. These indicators of civic disengagement3 are the soft center of today's avoidance of citizenship. At the hard edges are citizens who are so alienated that they stockpile weapons in the city, for use in turf wars, and against the police; in the back country, for use against officials who dare to enforce federal law, and if necessary (so the militiamen say), for use against the U.S. Army.4 The social issues that have played so prominent a part in national politics during the past generation race and gender and religion have provided an especially fertile ground for political operatives, both cynical and committed. Public discourse on the social issues has been largely sup-