The Decline of Political Trust in Spain and Portugal

Abstract

This article deals with the problem of the increasing distrust in institutions in European democracies, paying special attention to countries such as Spain and Portugal, which are being severely harmed by the current economic crisis and the austerity measures imposed by supranational organizations such as the European Union and implemented by their respective national governments. Contrary to the purely political-economic paradigm, the present article, based on panel survey data gathered during the years 2011 and 2012 in Spain and Portugal, shows that this deterioration is due principally to the negative perception of the political responsiveness of representative institutions and aggravated by the increasing perception of political corruption. Multilevel governance and the present economic crisis are challenging representative institutions, but their functioning and elite misbehavior during the crisis are the main explanations of increasing citizen distrust in such institutions.

Do people want more participation? Tensions and conflicts in governance in times of scepticism

“…Moreover, the Spanish adhere to a profile of low interest in politics and a relatively low perception of internal and external political efficacy (Bonet et al, 2006: 118). In contrast, the preference for democracy is very high (Torcal, 2014).…”

“…As many other South European countries, two of the most salient features of Spanish political culture have been distrust in the political institutions and indifference towards politics. Popular distrust facing political institutions followed a dramatic upward trend in the period 1980-2012 (Torcal, 2014). Moreover, the Spanish adhere to a profile of low interest in politics and a relatively low perception of internal and external political efficacy (Bonet et al, 2006: 118).…”

Monarquía y opinión pública en España durante la crisis: el desempeño de una institución no responsable bajo estrés

“…Una de ellas es el impacto de la crisis económica de 2008, que para algunos países del sur de Europa, ha supuesto una critical juncture (Morlino y Raniolo, 2017: 4;Rifà, 2017). Otros estudios subrayan que las actitudes hacia la política de las nuevas generaciones presentan alguna diferencia frente las de cohortes anteriores (life-cycle effects) (Llera, 2016;Torcal, 2014;Urquizu, 2016).…”

The procyclicality of political trust in Spain

“…Hetherington 1998, p. 791), and it has been shown that trust in different political institutions is an "interrelated" and "unidimensional" concept. Therefore, a low level of political trust in a country usually goes together with low levels of trust in the diverse political institutions of that country (José R. Montero, Sonja Zmerli, and Ken Newton 2008;Mariano Torcal 2014). On the other hand, the existence of a high level of political trust would improve the reliability of the specific political institutions of that nation, which could propel good democratic and economic performance.…”

“…Second, the economic crisis and the restrictive political measures that were applied by the different Spanish governments have affected the welfare perceptions and political attitudes of the Spanish society Caballero and Álvarez-Díaz 2015), and political dissatisfaction has emerged through several social movements and general strikes in Spain (Caballero 2014). The resulthas been that, between 2008 and 2012, "the increase of distrust among citizens in Spain rose from 22.9% to 51.1% for the national parliament, from 53.8% to 77.7% for political parties, from 52.8% to 76.4% for politicians" (Torcal 2014).…”