The effect of anticorruption policies on social and political trust: a comparative approach

Abstract

Purpose Corruption and anti-corruption are two often studied topics in social sciences today and often highly debated issues in both the national and international political arena. They are important in the context of democratization and democratic consolidation as they include the idea of a government that serves its citizens in a transparent manner, and tie with it notions of social and political trust. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the relationship between anti-corruption policies and social and political trust and hypothesizes that anti-corruption policies have a desired positive effect on social and political trust in settings with low and moderate levels of corruption, whereas they have no effect in highly corrupt settings. Design/methodology/approach The study uses regression analysis and includes all world democracies (33) for which complete data are available for a period of nine years (2005-2014). Findings Results indicate that anti-corruption policies have the expected results on social trust: in low to moderately corrupt countries, the effect is positive, while it disappears in highly corrupt countries. There are no significant effects on political trust. Research limitations/implications While the results are mixed, they point to the importance of studying further the relationship. Originality/value This study is important because it questions the effect of anti-corruption policies that are assumed to have particular effects on corruption. It is also the first study to analyze the effect on such policies on social and political trust in democracies.

Disinformation as Geopolitical Risk for Transatlantic Institutions

“…Here it is important to emphasize social capital, which indicates the quality of social norms, trust and relations (World Economic Forum, 2018). Social trust improves economic efficiency, while low trust leads to reduced cooperation, increased corruption and undermining of democratic political institutions, especially in particularistic societies (Radin, 2018). On the other hand, societies with universal values have clearly applied rules of correct behavior, where decreasing particularism in turn decreases corruption, which is lower in long-lasting market economies and democracies with larger Protestant populations (Rotondi and Stanca, 2015), as can be seen in Figure 4.…”