Citizen perceptions of regulatory enforcement styles: a focus group research in six countries

The study of citizen trust in regulatory agencies is complicated by the fact that most citizens do not have direct regulatory encounters with agencies. This paper uses focus groups to explore citizen perceptions of regulatory agencies in six countries. Focus groups are particularly suitable as the interaction between participants can be conducive to revealing perceptions and ideas on complex issues. The current study aimed to understand the influence of regulatory enforcement on citizens’ trust. It is part of the TiGRe study, a H2020 project on Trust in Governance and Regulation in Europe, and includes contributions of six country teams. The focus groups explore citizens’ views on what constitutes a trustworthy regulator, perceptions regarding the trustworthiness of the food safety regulator, and citizens’ evaluations of particular enforcement styles in six countries: Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Israel, the Netherlands, and Norway. The results show that citizens consider transparency, integrity, and expertise to be the key traits of a trustworthy regulator. The knowledge of citizens regarding the work of the food safety regulator in their country is rather limited, however, this does not appear to prevent them from placing high levels of trust in its work. When it comes to specific enforcement styles, it does not appear that they have a direct effect on citizens’ trust. There was more overlap than difference between respondents from different countries, All in all, citizens don’t seem to base their trust on specific regulatory interventions or style, but attach more value to process variables such as transparency, expertise and integrity. What citizens consider to be an appropriate regulatory action in a given situation, would largely depend on the specifics of the situation.