Does enforcement style influence citizen trust in regulatory agencies? An experiment in six countries

Stephan Grimmelikhuijsen*, Marija Aleksovska, Judith van Erp, Sharon Gilad, Libby Maman, Tobias Bach, Moritz Kappler, Wouter Van Dooren, Rahel M. Schomaker, Heidi Houlberg Salomonsen

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

Establishing and maintaining citizen trust is vital for the effectiveness and long-term viability of regulatory agencies. However, limited empirical research has been conducted on the relationship between regulatory action and citizen trust. This article addresses this gap by investigating the influence of various regulatory enforcement styles on citizen trust. We conducted a pre-registered and representative survey experiment in six countries (n = 5,765): Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Israel, the Netherlands, and Norway. Our study focuses on three key dimensions of enforcement style: formalism, coerciveness, and accommodation. We hypothesize that a strict and punitive enforcement style with minimal accommodation will enhance citizen trust. Surprisingly, we found no overall effect of enforcement on trust. However, specifically high levels of formalism (strictness) and coerciveness (punitiveness) exhibited a small positive effect on trust. Furthermore, we observed no discernible impact of an accommodative enforcement style. Additional analyses revealed that the effects of enforcement style were not consistent across country and regulatory domains. This suggests we need to reconsider assumptions underlying enforcement theory, as our findings imply that public trust seems less conditional on heavy-handed enforcement than initially anticipated.
Original languageEnglish
Number of pages16
JournalJournal of Public Administration Research and Theory
DOIs
Publication statusE-pub ahead of print - 17 Oct 2024

Keywords

  • Comparative research
  • Enforcement
  • Regulatory agencies
  • Survey experiment
  • Trust

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Does enforcement style influence citizen trust in regulatory agencies? An experiment in six countries'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this