Congruence, national context and trust in European institutions. Issue 12 (2nd December 2019)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Torcal, Mariano; Christmann, Pablo
• Is Part Of: Journal of European public policy. Volume 26:Issue 12(2019)
• Page Start: 1779
• Page End: 1798
• Publication Date: 2019-12-02
• Subjects: European Union -- institutional trust -- corruption -- financial crisis -- panel analysis -- Spain; European Union countries -- Politics and government -- Periodicals; Political planning -- European Union countries -- Periodicals; Politique publique -- Pays de l'Union européenne -- Périodiques; Pays de l'Union européenne -- Politique et gouvernement -- Périodiques; 361.61094
• DOI: 10.1080/13501763.2018.1551922
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1350-1763

Abstract

ABSTRACT: How can we explain the recent decline of trust in representative institutions of the EU in many of its Member States? This article presents evidence supporting the congruence hypothesis, according to which citizens have been extrapolating their increasing distrust in national institutions to the EU institutions. We also find that these contagion effects are produced by citizens' evaluations of national governments. Furthermore, we show that these spillover effects from the national to the EU level tend to be stronger in situations of economic recession and political crisis. The only counterbalance to this contagion comes from citizens' positive evaluation of EU performance. We test these general arguments based on a twofold panel analysis of the Spanish case, a country that has suffered a remarkable deterioration of political trust in a context of profound economic and political crisis, by analysing data from a micro-level panel study and 28 pooled surveys from the Eurobarometer between 1999 and 2015.