To Be, or Not to Be: The Role of Self-Perception in European Countries’ Performance Assessment

Sara Casagrande () and Bruno Dallago
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Sara Casagrande: Department of Economics and Management, University of Trento, Via Inama, 5, 38122 Trento, Italy
Bruno Dallago: Department of Economics and Management, University of Trento, Via Inama, 5, 38122 Trento, Italy

Sustainability, 2022, vol. 14, issue 20, 1-23

Abstract: Performance evaluation is commonly based on objective indicators which do not explicitly consider the role of perceptions. Especially when evaluating countries’ performance, citizens’ perceptions can influence public debate and socio-economic narratives. Since these may influence policy making and countries’ performance, perceptions should not be ignored. The objective of this article is to investigate the presence of discrepancies between objective performance and self-perception (subjective performance) among European Union countries. The aim is to raise awareness of the importance of recognizing biases in performance perception as factors that may hamper European debate, countries’ relations and, thus, the political and social sustainability of the European project. The article considers five spending areas that may influence the public opinion’s assessment about countries’ performance (education, environmental protection, health, public order and safety and social protection) and compares objective and subjective indicators for 28 EU countries from 2007 to 2017 using the distance-to-frontier score methodology. The results indicate that the discrepancies are significant, with a generalized tendency toward overestimation, especially among some Central and Northern European countries. The opposite occurred in Greece and some Eastern European countries. These results represent a starting point for grasping an undervalued aspect of the complexity of the European socio-economic environment.

Keywords: distance-to-frontier; economic methodology; environment; European Union; institutional frameworks; objective and subjective performance; perceptions; spending areas; sustainability (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
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