Radical Distrust: Are Economic Policy Attitudes Tempered by Social Trust?

Hans Pitlik and Martin Rode

Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, 2021, vol. 158, issue 2, No 5, 485-506

Abstract: Abstract Debates about the appropriate role of markets and governments are often shaped by sharply contrasting opinions. Based on individual data from the World Values Survey and the European Values Study for up to 190,000 respondents in a sample of 68 democratic countries, we find that social trust is associated with tempered attitudes regarding government intervention and redistribution. Results corroborate ideas from socio-psychological research that trusting people have personality attributes which work towards a moderation on politically divisive topics. Complementary to the literature on political polarization, this opens the possibility that trusting societies may be superior at adapting polices to novel challenges because social trust reduces the probability of extreme attitude formation.

Keywords: Social trust; Polarization; Policy attitudes; Preference formation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D70 D78 Z13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Working Paper: Radical Distrust: Are Economic Policy Attitudes Tempered by Social Trust? (2019)
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DOI: 10.1007/s11205-020-02317-8

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