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Is trust in government really declining? Evidence using the sequential probability ratio test

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Abstract

Evidence for declining trust in government is often presented as the difference between the present day and an idealized period of high trust in government. The fact is, though, trust in government, in many OECD countries, was relatively low historically and remains so now. This questions whether one can definitively state that trust is declining. If trust in government is not declining but instead fluctuating, then the effects of declining trust on political and policy outcomes may be overstated. Additionally, if trust is relatively stable, then it suggests that marginal shifts in trust may be affected by specific policy actions rather than large shifts in citizens’ attitudes. Using a simple yet powerful tool, the Sequential Probability Ratio Test, this analysis tests whether trust is in general decline. This test works in a manner that is different from traditional hypothesis testing. Rather than using fixed samples, one chooses a single measure—such as trust at an idealized time or average trust within a given period, and then tests whether individual observations are different than that observation. The findings provide evidence that in all but a few cases, one cannot find statistically significant evidence for declining trust in government in OECD countries. Therefore, statements of general decline in trust may be overstated and relying on declining trust as an explanatory variable may require consideration of the events that preceded those declines.

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Notes

  1. 2003−2018 are the time periods for recording this variable on the Eurobarometer. As noted by Van de Walle and colleagues, the availability of long-run trust data in countries outside of the USA is largely unavailable.

  2. The Pedersen index (Pedersen 1979) is based on the vote share of all parties with ≥ 1% of the vote in each election plus all parties that have won at least one seat. It runs the time series from 1945 onward.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Charleston, Charleston, USA

    Jonathan Rauh

  2. Variance Analytics, LLC, Columbia, USA

    Jonathan Rauh

  3. Trident United Way, Charleston, USA

    Jonathan Rauh

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Rauh, J. Is trust in government really declining? Evidence using the sequential probability ratio test. Acta Polit 56, 500–529 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41269-020-00163-7

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