Can TV Politics Improve the Trust Pattern of “Intimate Central Government and Alienate Local Government”?

Abstract

The hierarchical and descending trust pattern among Chinese citizens toward governments at all levels, characterized by a stronger trust in the central government and a weaker trust in local governments, often leads to the “Tacitus trap” in local government governance. As a new platform for public participation and local government supervision, can TV political programs improve the trust pattern of “intimate central government and alienate local government,” and achieve a balance of trust between the central and local governments? Using data from the Social Consciousness Survey Data of Netizens 2018, we conducted an empirical analysis of the impact of TV political programs on residents’ trust patterns toward different levels of government. The results of this study show that: first, the opening of TV political programs can significantly narrow the trust gap between the central and local governments. This primarily achieved by significantly increasing the level of trust that residents have in the provincial government. Second, influence mechanism reveals that the introduction of of TV political programs can reduce the residents’ trust gap between central and local governments mainly by bolstering government transparency, fortifying government responsiveness, and boosting residents’ political efficacy. Third, the heterogeneity analysis indicates that TV political programs can significantly improve the trust gap between central and local governments among various groups, including women, youth, democratic party members and the public, high digitalization ability, residents in the east and provincial capital cities. Fourth, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the opening of TV political programs significantly increase residents’ trust in the central government but do not significantly raise residents’ trust in local governments. This may, to some extent, reinforce the trend of “intimate central government and alienate local government” among the public .

Keywords

TV politics Tacitus trap intimate central government and alienate local government government transparency government responsiveness political efficacy

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Acock

Clarke

Stewart

(1985) A new model for old measures: a covariance structure analysis of political efficacy. The Journal of Politics 47(4): 1062–1084.

Ahmad

Akhtar

Jabeen

, et al. (2021) Intention-based critical factors affecting willingness to adopt novel coronavirus prevention in Pakistan: implications for future pandemics. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 18(11): 6167.

Barnett

Hyde

(2001) Women, men, work, and family: an expansionist theory. American Psychologist 56(10): 781–796.

Bene

(2020) Does context matter? A cross-country investigation of the effects of the media context on external and internal political efficacy. International Journal of Comparative Sociology 61(4): 264–286.

Bertot

Jaeger

Grimes

(2010) Using ICTs to create a culture of transparency: e-government and social media as openness and anti-corruption tools for societies. Government Information Quarterly 27(3): 264–271.

Besley

Dray

(2021) Institutions, trust and responsiveness: patterns of government and private action during the COVID-19 pandemic. LSE Public Policy Review 1(4): 1–11.

Chen

Paolino

Mason

(2021) Who protests and why: hierarchical government trust and protest participation in China. Journal of East Asian Studies 21(3): 499–513.

Christensen

Lægreid

(2005) Trust in government: the relative importance of service satisfaction, political factors, and demography. Public Performance & Management Review 28(4): 487–511.

Christensen

Yamamoto

Aoyagi

(2020) Trust in local government: service satisfaction, culture, and demography. Administration & Society 52(8): 1268–1296.

10.

Diener

Biswas-Diener

(2002) Will money increase subjective well-being? Social Indicators Research 57(2): 119–169.

11.

Estrada

Bastida

(2020) Effective transparency and institutional trust in Honduran municipal governments. Administration & Society 52(6): 890–926.

12.

Fitzgerald

Wolak

(2016) The roots of trust in local government in western Europe. International Political Science Review 37(1): 130–146.

13.

Gordon

(2000) Public trust in government: the US media as an agent of accountability? International Review of Administrative Sciences 66(2): 297–310.

14.

Grimmelikhuijsen

Welch

(2012) Developing and testing a theoretical framework for computer-mediated transparency of local governments. Public Administration Review 72(4): 562–571.

15.

Guo

(2001) Land expropriation and rural conflicts in China. The China Quarterly 166: 422–439.

16.

Han

Nigg

(2011) How does disaster relief works affect the trust in local government? A study of the Wenchuan earthquake. Risk, Hazards & Crisis in Public Policy 2(4): 1–20.

17.

Hays

Page

Buhalis

(2013) Social media as a destination marketing tool: its use by national tourism organisations. Current Issues in Tourism 16(3): 211–239.

18.

(2021) Outward specific trust in the balancing of hierarchical government trust: evidence from mainland China. The British Journal of Sociology 72(3): 774–792.

19.

Irvin

Stansbury

(2004) Citizen participation in decision making: is it worth the effort? Public Administration Review 64(1): 55–65.

20.

Kang

Zhu

(2021) Do people trust the government more? Unpacking the distinct impacts of anticorruption policies on political trust. Political Research Quarterly 74(2): 434–449.

21.

Kim

Lee

(2012) E-participation, transparency, and trust in local government. Public Administration Review 72(6): 819–828.

22.

Lanin

Hermanto

(2019) The effect of service quality toward public satisfaction and public trust on local government in Indonesia. International Journal of Social Economics 46(3): 377–392.

23.

(2004) Political trust in rural China. Modern China 30(2): 228–258.

24.

Liu

Sun

(2009) A comparison of the spatial distribution of innovative activities in China and the U.S. Technological Forecasting and Social Change 76(6): 797–805.

25.

Liu

Raine

(2016) Why is there less public trust in local government than in central government in China? International Journal of Public Administration 39(4): 258–269.

26.

(2016) How does e-government usage affect citizen trust: the mediating effects of government transparency and responsiveness. Journal of Public Administration 9(6): 44–63. Available at: https://www.cnki.com.cn/Article/CJFDTotal-GGXZ201606006.htm (in Chinese).

27.

Muñoz

(2017) Political trust and multilevel government. In: Zmerli

Van der Meer

TWG

(eds) Handbook on Political Trust. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing, pp.69–88.

28.

Porumbescu

(2015) Using transparency to enhance responsiveness and trust in local government: can it work? State and Local Government Review 47(3): 205–213.

29.

Robinson

S. E.

Ripberger

J. T.

Gupta

Ross

J. A.

Fox

A. S.

Jenkins-Smith

H. C.

Silva

C. L

. (2021). The relevance and operations of political trust in the COVID-19 pandemic. Public Administration Review, 81(6), 1110–1119. https://doi.org/10.1111/puar.13333

30.

Skoric

Poor

(2013) Youth engagement in Singapore: the interplay of social and traditional media. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media 57(2): 187–204.

31.

Sobaci

(2016) Social media and local governments: an overview. In: Sobaci

(ed.) Social Media and Local Governments. Cham: Springer, pp.3–21.

32.

Solt

(2008) Economic inequality and democratic political engagement. American Journal of Political Science 52(1): 48–60.

33.

Meng

(2016) Selective responsiveness: online public demands and government responsiveness in authoritarian China. Social Science Research 59: 52–67.

34.

Zhou

(2021) Government trust in a time of crisis: survey evidence at the beginning of the pandemic in China. China Review 21(2): 87–116.

35.

Uitermark

Duyvendak

Kleinhans

(2007) Gentrification as a governmental strategy: social control and social cohesion in Hoogvliet, Rotterdam. Environment and Planning A 39(1): 125–141.

36.

Walgrave

Van Aelst

(2006) The contingency of the mass media’s political Agenda setting power: toward a preliminary theory. Journal of Communication 56(1): 88–109.

37.

Wang

Xing

Wei

, et al. (2020) Public opinion information dissemination in mobile social networks-taking Sina Weibo as an example. Information Discovery and Delivery 48(4): 213–224.

38.

Wang

(2005) Before the emergence of critical citizens: economic development and political trust in China. International Review of Sociology 15(1): 155–171.

39.

Wolak

Palus

(2010) The dynamics of public confidence in U.S. state and local government. State Politics & Policy Quarterly 10(4): 421–445.

40.

Song

(2020) Temporal dynamics of political trust in China: a cohort analysis. China Information 34(1): 109–136.

41.

Zhang

(2022) Exploring the effects of traditional media, social media, and foreign media on hierarchical levels of political trust in China. Global Media and China 7(3): 357–377.

42.

Yamamura

Tsutsui

Yamane

, et al. (2015) Trust and happiness: comparative study before and after the great East Japan earthquake. Social Indicators Research 123(3): 919–935.

43.

Yao

(2022) E-participation decision across different channels. Information Technology & People 35(3): 956–976.

44.

Zhang

(2014) From state to market: private participation in China’s urban infrastructure sectors, 1992–2008. World Development 64: 473–486.