How Japan’s COVID-19 vaccination policy shapes trust in governance: a relative deprivation approach

Naoki Sudo

Social Science Japan Journal, 2025, vol. 28, issue 1, 101278-3

Abstract: This study examines changes in the association between social policy performance and trust in government, focusing on the Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccination policy implemented by Japan’s central government. Data from the Online Panel Survey of Stratification and Social Psychology (SSPW2021-Panel) were analyzed using two-way fixed effects regression models. The quadratic term of the COVID-19 vaccination rate at the prefecture level had statistically significant effects on the evaluation of the central government’s infection control policies and trust in the central government. This implies that the relative deprivation experienced by unvaccinated individuals weakened trust in the central government in the early stage, and the decline in the number of unvaccinated individuals strengthened trust in the central government in the latter stage. Thus, this paper finds that even if a social policy meets people’s demands, its implementation may temporally damage the government’s reputation through relative deprivation.

Keywords: relative deprivation; trust in government; social policy; COVID-19 vaccination policy; Japan (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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