Do Anticorruption Campaigns Boost Trust In Government? Evidence From China?

Abstract

Governments often launch anticorruption campaigns to regain public trust; whereas campaigns may potentially inflate corruption perceptions and decrease trust. This study examines campaigns’ impact on political trust using the case of the recent anticorruption drive in China by combining longitudinal data from a large national survey and field interviews. Difference-in-Differences (DID) models show that stronger anticorruption efforts can increase political trust generally. However, distinct social groups may increase trust differently depending on their reliance on process-based or propaganda-based trust generation mechanisms. State-system insiders (e.g. civil servants, businessmen) tend to increase trust less than outsiders because of their direct experience of radical implementation process and ineffective outcomes of the campaign. People who are better educated and informed with alternative information are more critical to anticorruption achievements propaganda and increase trust less than those less informed. Therefore, anticorruption campaigns have increased trust more effectively for the grassroots than the elite in China.