Evaluations of Government Effectiveness, Political Trust, and Support for Alternatives to Liberal Democracy

How important are citizens’ evaluations of the functioning of public institutions for their views on alternatives to liberal democracy? And what role does political trust play in this relationship? It has been well established in previous research that the quality and effectiveness of public institutions– and in particular citizens’ perceptions of institutional performance – is important for political support. Many studies have demonstrated a strong relationship between perceptions of political and economic performance and people’s evaluations of the functioning of democracy (e.g. satisfaction with the way democracy works) and political trust. Recently, it has also been shown that institutional quality and government effectiveness is important also for citizens’ perceptions of the political system more generally, for example diffuse support for democracy as a system of government and rejection of non-democratic regime alternatives. In this study, we add to the research by examining how perceptions of government effectiveness affect support for three specific alternatives to liberal democracy that have come to be increasingly relevant in contemporary democracies: referendums (direct democracy), political decision-making by independent experts (technocracy), and government by business leaders (plutocracy). Moreover, we investigate if political trust plays any important role in this potential relationship. We argue that general political trust may function as a type of democratic buffer, making people less likely to let dissatisfaction with system performance (such as the state of the economy and delivery of welfare services) lead to support for alternative types of government. The empirical analysis combines a three-wave panel survey from Norway (Weltrust, 2021-2023) and modules 5 and 6 of the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems (CSES). Thus, we are able to assess both broader comparative patterns as well as individual-level changes in the relationship between evaluations of government effectiveness, political trust, and support for alternatives to liberal democracy.