(Mis)Trust and democracy: political polarization Central Europe and its influence on democratic backsliding processes

Political trust has long been regarded as an important element of regime support and factor of regime stability. It is widely associated with a number of positive outcomes in representative democracies. Trust drives citizens’ interest and engagement in politics, increases voting turnout and makes law-abiding behaviour more common. Thus, trust is frequently equated to diffuse regime support and thus linked to the effective functioning and stability of the political system. Saying that, political mistrust presents the reversal phaenomenon, influencing negatively the stability of democratic regimes, when discouraging several societal groups from active political participation or preferring the anti-systemic solutions. One of the key elements influencing the political (mis)trust present the new forms of political polarization. In the last two decades we can observe visible rise of impulses negatively influencing the political trust; this trend is often labelled as polycrisis. Nevertheless, many indicators and signs of growing mistrust might be reflected already in 1960s-1980s, as for example the growth of new social movements and the related phaenomenon of Partaienverdrossenheit and party dealignment manifest. The continual erosion of traditional "Rokkanian" cleavages, destabilisation of post-WW II party systems, dramatic decline in party membership, the revolution in mass communication related with the social media, as well as the onset of challenger parties such as media parties, business-firm parties and entrepreneurial parties present challenge for both the political practice as well as the expert reflection. The aim of the contribution is to systematize and deepen the understanding of the intersection of political polarization and trust. Specifically, we focus on the important issues: 1) the polarization–trust nexus, i.e. how the interconnection between the polarization and trust might be reflected in partial cases and how it might be generalised in new or transformed theories and concepts; 2) legacy of (mis)trust) in East-Central Europe that presents one of important long-term trends in the societies. Such phaenomenon was related with the creation of nationally oriented civil societies within the Habsburg Empire, as well as with the existence of different types of opposition against the Communist regimes. In, both, as well as other cases (mis)trust presented the creative impulse for political participation and representative democracy. We assume that similar development – and legacy – might be expected also within the hybrid regimes and soft authoritarianisms in the region. For the paper, we will use the data recently collected within the Horizon Europe "Truedem" project, and specifically search for indicators and measures related with polarization, trust and democratic backsliding in the region.