Navigating Trust in Times of Crisis: Unveiling the Role of Transparency

This paper investigates the intricate interplay between trust, transparency, and crisis management in multilevel settings. During crises, citizens’ trust has proved fundamental to ensure compliance with the difficult measures, such as the ones touching upon fundamental rights taken during the COVID-19 pandemic (Caplanova et al. 2021; Siegrist et al. 2021). Literature on crisis management has also prescribed transparency in communication and policy-making (Boin et al. 2016). While frequently associated with anticorruption and open government policies, transparency is expected to increase trust in government and, therefore, it may play an important role in measure acceptance and compliance during crisis. Other studies have also explored the impact of multilevel governance in the trust-transparency nexus (Stafford et al. 2022). However, despite the social desirability of transparency, evidence on its beneficial impact on trust remains debated (Mallibard & Pasquier 2016) and policy-makers may not always regard it as a priority in crisis management. This research aims to contribute to this debate by asking to what extent do citizens value transparency of decision-making during crisis situations and what impact does it have in political trust? To unravel this conundrum, we employed a survey experiment methodology, delving into public perceptions of transparency and its impact on trust in government actions during crisis scenarios. Our findings reveal a strong association between transparency of the decision-making processes and trust, with citizens emphasizing transparency as the paramount value when assessing multilevel governmental responses in crisis situations.