Berghs betraktelser

Devine och Valgarðsson, "Stability and Change in Political Trust", kommande i EJPR

Empirically, we study within-individual stability of political trust using six panel studies that cover five countries between 1965 and 2020. Our results consistently point to trust being stable in the long term, with potential for short-term volatility in response to changing political contexts, and for substantial changes between people’s formative years and their adulthood. Even over a period of 19 years, most people’s responses to trust questions are remarkably similar between surveys and significant life events such as unemployment and going to University do not significantly influence trust. Changes in the political environment, like incumbent government turnover, have larger effects but these appear to return to equilibrium in a few years. The exception to this general finding is individuals who are first surveyed when they are under the age of 18, who appear much more likely to change their trust levels in subsequent waves.

Har pandemin tagit knäcken på svensk tillit och sammanhållning i samhället? Det verkar inte så, enligt två nya studier.

Ur abstract till studien "Impact of COVID-19 on Neighborhood Social Support and Social Interactions in Umeå Municipality, Sweden" av Liv Zetterberg m fl:

We asked whether neighbors talk to, care for, and help each other, before and during the Covid crisis. Individuals rated their health as poor or good. We compared people’s self-rated health and their perceptions about their neighborhoods between those who lived in high or low/medium social capital neighborhoods. Before the pandemic, participants in high social capital neighborhoods reported more active neighborhood interaction and support. During the crisis, social interaction and support increased in all neighborhoods, but more in high social capital neighborhoods. Overall, people seemed to help and care for each other more during than before the crisis.

En annan studie (som jag nämnt tidigare) är "How the coronavirus crisis affects citizen trust in institutions and in unknown others: Evidence from ‘the Swedish experiment’" av Peter Esaiasson m fl (2020) gjord med hjälp av medborgarpanelen:

We find support for the view that the corona crisis led to higher levels of institutional and interpersonal trust. Moreover, reactions were largely homogeneous across those groups that could potentially relate distantly to government authorities.

Uppdatering: Jämfört med Danmark tycks dock svensk tillit till regering och folkhälsomyndigheter vara med ideologiskt polariserad, visar Johannes Lindvall och Julie Hassing Nielsen i studien "Trust in government in Sweden and Denmark during the COVID-19 epidemic":

Using three original representative surveys conducted in Sweden and Denmark between late March and late June, 2020, this article answers these questions. It finds that Danes consistently trusted their government and health authorities more than the Swedes did. While Swedish trust was politicized and shaped by ideology from the onset of the pandemic, this only later became the case in Denmark.

Ny studie av Liliia Korol och Pieter Bevelander i Current Psychology. Ur abstract:

The results revealed that young adults who were satisfied with important life domains were more likely to extend their satisfaction towards the political system, which consequently resulted in a generalised expectation of trustworthiness and a widening of their circles of trusted others. This then translates into more positive attitudes toward immigrants. The findings provide evidence that it is the causal relationship between political satisfaction and social trust (rather than social trust in itself) which promotes the positive impact of life satisfaction on tolerance towards immigrants.

Huvudresultatet i "Political party preference and social trust in four Nordic countries" i Comparative European Politics (Koivula et al, 2017): Väljare som rörstar på populistpartier har signifikant lägre tillit än övriga väljare.

1. Tilliten till medmänniskor och institutioner uppvisar inte någon fallande trend
2. Trägårdhs funderingar kring orsakerna till den påstått fallande sociala sammanhållningen tycks vara spekulationer som saknar forskningsstöd och delvis faktiskt motsägs av forskning.

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