Re-thinking trust in Scotland: from theory to practice

6. Recommendations

1. Improved understanding of trust in Scotland. There should be more research, in particular qualitative research and mixed-methods research, to explore and measure the ‘family of trust’ in Scotland and how people might transition between different levels of trust. The two concepts of ‘cynical distrust’ and ‘healthy mistrust’ are of particular interest here. Governments need to be able to better distinguish between the two, assess whether more knowledge on this can develop ways of constructively engaging with scepticism – and whether this can contribute to limiting the risk of ‘cynical distrust’ developing. How can we measure these, and what are the political behaviours associated with them? How, when, where and for whom does healthy mistrust (aka scepticism) turn into cynical distrust? This is important because the evidence set out in this report shows us that it is not a decline in levels of trust which in itself results in a threat to democracy, nor the rise of sceptical mistrust, but the rise of cynical distrust. When mistrust turns into widespread distrust or cynicism, representative democracy and its institutions might be under threat. Improved tools to measure and differentiate the different families of trust in Scotland are needed to better understand and frame trust, consequently assisting to develop effective and problem-specific initiatives.

2. National surveys in Scotland could benefit from seeking to further join the international aim of standardising and improving measurements of trust, whilst at the same time improving their own independent research on trust. The OECD is working towards standardising measurements of trust on a national and international level. This is considered a positive improvement to which governments should contribute. However, while the OECD data provide insight on general trends that are useful for understanding what drives levels of trust in Scotland, it reports only at the UK level. Given the historic and current differences in levels of public trust in the Scottish Government compared to the UK Government, there will be a need for a combination of national and international research to best be able to measure and make initiatives to improve levels of trust in Scotland.

3. Encourage and enable more critical engagement opportunities with citizens, seeing it as important for government to let citizens practice scepticism as an indicator of a healthy democracy. This is key because the evidence in this report suggests that ‘critical citizens’ who are sceptical towards their political systems do not threaten democracy, but rather strengthen democracy by making the effort to stay informed and work for accountability from politicians and political institutions. In practice, this could look like for instance focusing on institutional reform which makes it easier for citizens to be involved in good decision-making.

4. Increased cooperation and openness between governments to share experiences on trust initiatives. For example, Scotland’s Open Government work is part of an Open Government Partnership network called Nordic+, an informal peer exchange group where government points of contact and civil society meet to cross-pollinate ideas, identify best open government practices, and share their experiences in implementing open government reforms. Governments should take inspiration from such initiatives of existing cooperation, to develop more effective initiatives by learning from each other’s successes and challenges.