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Fifty years of declining confidence and increasing polarization in trust

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Over the past 50 years, faith in most American political and non-political institutions has plummeted, except for the military and science. Henry Brady discusses.

Image courtesy of interviewee. March 15, 2024

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The speaker reflects on their 12 years of experience as an academic administrator, particularly addressing the worrying decline in trust in various institutions, including higher education, government, and non-political institutions. They conducted extensive research, analyzing over 165,000 survey responses spanning 50 years, revealing a significant decrease in public confidence across institutions.

Key findings indicate strong polarization in trust levels between different political groups, with Democrats and Republicans having contrasting views on institutions like the military, policing, higher education, and science. This video video polarization poses challenges for collective action and problem-solving in society, as starkly different perceptions hinder consensus on issues.

The speaker identifies various contributors to declining trust, including increasing inequality, demographic shifts toward a more diverse society, and intensified scrutiny of institutions. They express concern that this environment, combined with the inability or unwillingness to reach compromise on identity issues (like abortion), makes it challenging for society to progress and reform institutions effectively.

The conclusion emphasizes the critical need for trusted institutions to effectively tackle societal issues, warning that ongoing distrust and polarization could impede the ability to address problems such as police brutality and public health crises.

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X-TIMESTAMP-MAP:LOCAL=00:00:00.000,MPEGTS=900000

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I was an academic administrator for 12 years.

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I was Dean of the Goldman School, which is behind me here.

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And, I was very concerned

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with the decline in trust in higher education.

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And so I went and collected some data on that.

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But as I collected the data,

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I got data on other institutions,

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and I was shocked to find out there'd been decline in

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confidence in essentially every institution.

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But the military, I knew that was true for government.

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Uh, that's been a longstanding truth.

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Uh, and so that was not a surprise,

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but the fact that it's occurred in

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what I call non-political institutions, some of which,

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like the police exist within government,

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but are not meant to be political in the sense of,

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politicized,

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that we still had decline in faith in those.

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And then the second thing I noticed was

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that there was polarization in that faith.

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So that Democrats had one view of some institutions

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and Republicans had a decidedly different view.

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And those two things decline in trust

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and polarization made me worry.

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Uh, and the reason is this

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institutions are the way we get stuff done in society.

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They're really hard to build.

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And as an academic administrator, I learned that,

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it's really hard to build one that's good.

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Goldman school is a good one, and well regarded,

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and we're very lucky for that.

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Um, but it's hard to build them.

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And the notion

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that somehow there'd been such a decline in trust in them,

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and polarization in trust worried me in

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that we get things done in society through our institutions,

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and if we don't trust them, how are we gonna get things done

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and especially get things done as a society together.

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And we'll talk more about that as we go along,

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because that's really, I think, a big issue.

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What we have is, we put together my research assistant

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and co-author eventually, Brad Kent,

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Thomas, Brad Kent.

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Uh, we put together a data set that included Gallup polls,

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Harris polls, and I think called the General Social Survey.

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Um, and we ended up with over 165,000 respondents,

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asking questions about confidence or trust in Go Government

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and other institutions over 50 years, all the way back

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to the early 1970s.

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And so we have a very, very long data set,

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and we can look at trends over time.

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The four political institutions are the ones you'd expect,

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the executive, the president,

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the executive branch versus the president,

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somewhat distinct, Congress and the Supreme Court.

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Uh, and there we found

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that there's been tremendous

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decline in trust in all of them.

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Most precipitously for, Congress,

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but more recently for the Supreme Court.

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And in fact, even more recent data

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that we've just getting into, now shows that with Dobbs,

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the decision about abortion,

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that there's been really quite a decline in

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trust in the Supreme Court.

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Then there's 16 nonpolitical institutions.

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There's four institutions related to the economy,

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business and labor, the sort of two major pieces of our

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business corporation sector,

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and then banks and Wall Street.

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Uh, and there again, you find

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that trust has declined, quite a

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Bit over time, and especially for Wall Street and banks.

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And then there's seven institutions related to knowledge

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and information production.

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Um, these are things like higher education, science,

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the press television and TV news.

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Um, these institutions provide us with the knowledge

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and information we have in our society.

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Uh, and there again, you've seen, especially for the press,

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for journalism, for television news,

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precipitous declines in trust of them.

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Science is still pretty trusted,

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but it's starting to show declines.

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And more recently, more precipitous declines.

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So that's worrisome. And higher education was doing fine

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until maybe 10, 20 years ago.

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And then it started to show,

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significant declines in trust.

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So all of the information producing institutions

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are seeing declines.

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And then there's three related to

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what we call norm enforcement, the kinds of institutions

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that say what our norms and our morals

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and our ethics should be in a society.

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And that's religion, police, and the military.

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Uh, and there for police

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and, for, religion, we've seen declines in trust.

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Don't see it for the military.

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Uh, if you go way back to the 1960s

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and dig up some old questions, you find out

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that it turns out there was a lack of trust in the military.

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Then there was Vietnam that really brought it

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to a very low E and it's really increased since then.

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Um, for some reason, the military has escaped this decline

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in trust that has affected every other institution.

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And then finally, two, related to professional services.

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Uh, law and health, the medical sector.

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This covers just about everything in society.

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There's some that are left out, arts

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and entertainment, public utilities, philanthropy,

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agriculture,

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but I would say that the ones that are in there

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that we have questions about pretty much cover the gamut of

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what you'd want to cover for studying a modern society.

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If you don't trust an institution, then it does,

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it lacks some of the power that it needs, the legitimacy

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that it needs so that it can actually undertake changes.

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So, for example, if you don't trust the police,

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then it's gonna be hard

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to have an organization in your local area

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that provides safety to people

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because you don't trust the institution

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which is given that job.

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If you don't trust science, it's gonna be hard to believe

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and to accept the findings such as climate change

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that science has come up with.

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And so it'll be hard to actually do something about

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the change in climate.

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Um, and similarly with every other institution, medicine,

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if you don't trust medicine, it's gonna be hard when an

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epidemic comes along, to listen

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to the medical professionals

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and to do what they say you should do,

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such as get vaccinations.

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When I first, started looking with these questions,

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I was very worried about that, whether they were just fluff.

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Um, turns out they're not fluff.

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Um, you find out that they go up

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and down, in ways that really are quite predictable

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and that are based upon events that occur.

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And the also the characteristics of the people responding.

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So in terms of events, the military is the one

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where it's most clear.

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Um, so when we had the successful,

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war in the Mideast in 1991

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or so, the first mid East War, first ball, a Gulf War,

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that we did quite well at,

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we went in very quickly, things went well.

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Uh, you see trust in the military just goes way up.

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Uh, you see the same thing after nine 11 rally round.

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The flag effect, just what you'd expect.

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Then you see trust going down

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with the Iraq War in Afghanistan, wars becoming mired.

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And then finally, when you get the, a surge in Iraq,

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which was successful, you see trust in the military,

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military going up, and then

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you see that with every other item.

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Uh, banks trust in them go down

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when there are bank failures.

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So the late 1980s, there were a series of savings

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and loans, bank failures,

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trust in banks went down, wall Street.

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You see when you have the 2000,

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or so, small recession,

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then the.com recession, that trust in Wall Street goes down.

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Uh, same thing in 2000 7, 8 9,

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when we had the Great Recession trust in banks.

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'cause remember there were a lot of bank failures there

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and trust in Wall Street goes down.

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And finally you find that as unemployment goes down,

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trust in labor goes up.

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As GDP goes up, as we get more prosperous,

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trust in business goes up.

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So for all those reasons, you have

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to believe there's something real here

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because the questions seem

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to be capturing changes in ways that make sense.

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Uh, just from a a priority perspective, this is the thing

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that actually has me more worried even

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than distrust In institutions.

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Uh, Americans have historically been distrustful

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of governmental institutions.

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We were founded as a nation that was distrustful of a king.

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Uh, and so it's not surprising that we're distrustful

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of government, and it arguably is a good thing,

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that we're worried about authoritarianism

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and, about governments, which get too powerful.

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Um, and even institutions, you can imagine, well,

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that's maybe not a bad thing

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because in fact, maybe institutions aren't trustworthy.

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And if they're not trustworthy,

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then our trust should go down in them.

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And given the scandals, for example,

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in the Catholic Church scandals in some

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of the Protestant churches and other things, you can imagine

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that trust and religion should go down, and on and on.

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We, we can give many examples of where there's been events

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that have maybe made us less trustworthy.

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Also, the society's becoming more educated.

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And there's a lot of evidence that suggests that one

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of the things we do at higher education institutions is we

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make students question.

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That's what we're supposed to do.

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And when we make them question things,

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they question institutions as well.

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So all of that sort of makes sense,

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and at least is okay, maybe,

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although you wonder if trust gets solo,

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that it could be really a problem for society,

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like I indicated earlier.

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But what really worries me is polarization and trust.

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Suppose half the society thinks an institution's doing just

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great, police are doing great.

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No problems say Republicans by and large,

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and the other half of the society, Democrats say, no, no,

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police are really doing a bad job.

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We have to rethink the police

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and do policing in an entirely new way.

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Well, it's gonna be very hard to do anything

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to solve the problems of the police if you've got such

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differences of opinion about whether there's even a problem,

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much less what the solution to that problem should be.

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So we've got a lot of polarization

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where we find there are some institutions that are trusted

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by Democrats and some institutions that are trusted

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by Republicans more than by Democrats.

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So Republicans trust big business. That's not a surprise.

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Banks and Wall Street, and Democrats trust unions.

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Well, that's a historic artifact of the New Deal Coalition.

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And going back before that,

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Republicans basically became the party of business,

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at least in the 1920s, if not before.

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So that's not a surprise.

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But we also find

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that Republicans trust the norm enforcing institutions,

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religion, the military, and police,

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and Democrats distrust them.

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On the other hand, Republicans distrust higher education,

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science, journalism, TV news,

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and Democrats trust those institutions.

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Science, for a long while was trusted more

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by Republicans than Democrats,

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but now is distrusted more

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by Republicans than by Democrats.

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And in fact, there's a growing gap between Republicans

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and Democrats with respect to trust for science.

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So, and then by the way, in Intel recently, health

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and law were sort of equally trusted.

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Uh, but now especially with Covid,

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healthcare system is less trusted

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by Republicans than it used to be.

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And therefore, there's a growing gap, polar,

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a polarization there as well.

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Um, so what worries me is if you have polarization,

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how are you gonna solve problems?

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And how are you gonna get these institutions reformed in

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ways they need to be reformed, when in fact, Republicans

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and Democrats can't agree as to whether,

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even if there's a problem, much less what the solution is,

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those who study institutions say there's four ways

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you can get legitimacy.

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Um, one is it can be bestowed upon you by an, an authority.

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So for example, when a corporation gets a corporation

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charter that's bestowing on that corporation,

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some legitimacy says they can do

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business within the society.

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Um, the trouble with that is

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that increasingly government's not very trusted.

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Um, the second way is you can do things

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that are culturally appropriate.

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So for example, the mafia doesn't do things

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that are culturally appropriate, so it's not much trusted.

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Uh, but if you do things culturally appropriate,

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like run your hospital in the way people expect you

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to run your higher education institution the way people

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think you should and so forth, then you're going

11:44.995 --> 11:47.675
to get some legitimacy and ultimately trust.

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The third thing you can do is make sure

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that not only do you run it in a way that makes

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Sense to the society, and so you're trustworthy,

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but you also have a process, a a, a set of norms within

12:00.485 --> 12:02.285
that institution that makes sure

12:02.395 --> 12:04.805
that it does it in an ethical and moral fashion.

12:05.385 --> 12:07.285
Uh, so you have problems.

12:07.305 --> 12:08.605
If Bernie Madoff comes along

12:08.985 --> 12:11.165
and takes, advantage of a lot of people

12:11.465 --> 12:12.725
and a lot of people lose their money,

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then the financial system isn't much trusted.

12:15.945 --> 12:17.725
You have trouble. If you're the Catholic church

12:17.905 --> 12:20.165
and you have pedophile priests,

12:20.305 --> 12:22.925
people aren't gonna trust an institution that allows

12:22.925 --> 12:24.885
that kind of behavior to go on.

12:25.225 --> 12:28.445
Uh, so that's, that's the third way, ethical

12:28.545 --> 12:31.605
and moral operation of your institution.

12:31.825 --> 12:34.125
And then the fourth way is you can just perform well.

12:34.855 --> 12:36.355
You know, if you do such a good job,

12:36.705 --> 12:38.155
produce such good products,

12:38.295 --> 12:40.755
people actually sometimes excuse you for all sorts

12:40.755 --> 12:41.835
of other bad behaviors.

12:42.175 --> 12:45.115
So big business often gets away with, things like

12:45.795 --> 12:47.795
actually sourcing, material

12:47.975 --> 12:50.195
or, products from abroad

12:50.195 --> 12:51.835
that maybe even use child labor

12:52.175 --> 12:54.315
or that involve corruption in terms

12:54.335 --> 12:55.835
of bribes and things like that.

12:56.135 --> 12:57.795
Uh, but they perform so well.

12:57.795 --> 12:59.235
They provide such a good product.

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It's such a low price that people excuse them.

13:02.135 --> 13:04.835
Now, there's not a limitless possibility for that.

13:05.175 --> 13:07.555
At some point it may catch up with you, as we've seen

13:07.555 --> 13:08.635
with various corporations,

13:08.935 --> 13:11.315
but those are the four ways you get legitimacy.

13:11.445 --> 13:12.715
Government gives it to you.

13:13.095 --> 13:14.675
Uh, culturally, you do the right thing

13:15.185 --> 13:16.315
ethically and morally.

13:16.315 --> 13:19.845
You do the right thing, but finally you just perform so well

13:19.995 --> 13:21.605
that people say you're great.

13:22.105 --> 13:23.685
Uh, the trouble is, is that each

13:23.685 --> 13:25.365
of those have difficulties these days.

13:25.985 --> 13:29.165
Um, as I said, government's not much trusted.

13:29.305 --> 13:33.895
And so it's hard to get much, legitimacy

13:33.995 --> 13:36.135
by the fact that government has said you're

13:36.135 --> 13:37.175
our police department.

13:37.555 --> 13:40.095
Um, it's hard sometimes to do things

13:40.255 --> 13:41.735
'cause culturally there's been changes in

13:41.735 --> 13:43.015
notions of how things should be done.

13:43.595 --> 13:45.695
Police departments are suffering from this

13:45.695 --> 13:47.615
because there's been a cultural change in

13:47.755 --> 13:49.455
how people think policing should be done.

13:50.075 --> 13:52.615
Um, moral and ethically, that's a problem

13:52.615 --> 13:55.855
because so many institutions have suffered, partly

13:55.855 --> 13:57.375
because of the post-Watergate press,

13:57.625 --> 14:00.055
which has really gone into these institutions

14:00.055 --> 14:01.655
and looked for corruption.

14:01.955 --> 14:05.535
Uh, probably a good thing, trying to keep them,

14:05.865 --> 14:07.055
doing things correctly,

14:07.195 --> 14:08.255
but nevertheless meant

14:08.365 --> 14:10.935
that those institutions have suffered, ethical

14:10.935 --> 14:11.975
and moral lapses.

14:12.235 --> 14:14.135
And then finally, performance,

14:14.435 --> 14:16.295
is sometimes very hard to do.

14:16.565 --> 14:18.895
It's hard to perform well, and it's not even clear.

14:18.895 --> 14:22.135
That always works. The Biden administration, for example,

14:22.795 --> 14:25.775
has performed very well by most political scientists,

14:25.795 --> 14:26.815
at least standards.

14:26.845 --> 14:28.455
They've passed a lot of legislation.

14:28.755 --> 14:31.255
The economy is in very good shape by any standard.

14:31.595 --> 14:36.215
Uh, and yet there Biden himself is not got much confidence,

14:36.235 --> 14:37.255
of the American public.

14:37.755 --> 14:39.935
Uh, so there seems to be a problem even

14:40.215 --> 14:41.415
with performance these days.

14:41.955 --> 14:44.135
Uh, and that brings us to polarization.

14:44.435 --> 14:45.695
And that part of the problem seems

14:45.695 --> 14:47.815
to be the tremendous polarization we have.

14:48.215 --> 14:50.855
A bunch of things seem to be happening. Um, one is

14:50.855 --> 14:54.165
That there's all this increased scrutiny of institutions

14:54.165 --> 14:55.765
that goes beyond what we used to have

14:55.765 --> 14:59.605
before the 1970s, when institutions often got a pass.

14:59.955 --> 15:01.725
Certainly the Catholic church, for example,

15:01.725 --> 15:04.285
obviously got a pass for very bad behavior,

15:04.285 --> 15:05.805
which had been going on for a long time.

15:06.065 --> 15:07.685
And that's true of many other institutions.

15:08.025 --> 15:11.245
So first of all, the, the press no longer allows them

15:11.245 --> 15:12.605
to get away with some

15:12.605 --> 15:14.885
of the bad behaviors they used to get away with.

15:15.145 --> 15:17.605
So that may explain some of the decline in trust.

15:18.145 --> 15:20.485
Um, second of all, there seemed

15:20.485 --> 15:23.565
to be forces in American politics, events,

15:23.785 --> 15:26.005
things happening, that cause people

15:26.005 --> 15:28.605
to have less trust in general of one another

15:29.405 --> 15:30.425
and of institutions.

15:30.725 --> 15:33.265
And the two big things are inequality has increased.

15:33.845 --> 15:37.945
Um, in the 1970s, the top 1%

15:38.165 --> 15:40.745
of the wealth distribution had 25% of the wealth.

15:40.965 --> 15:43.105
That's a lot. But they now have 40%.

15:43.525 --> 15:46.145
Um, they used to have 10% of the income,

15:46.405 --> 15:48.065
now they got 20% of the income.

15:48.525 --> 15:50.105
Uh, so Americans look at this

15:50.365 --> 15:53.065
and they say, these institutions are ripping us off.

15:53.565 --> 15:55.505
And so inequality is one reason.

15:55.525 --> 15:57.905
It seems to me, we haven't proven that link,

15:57.905 --> 15:58.945
haven't done the research,

15:59.125 --> 16:00.745
but it seems very likely that it's important.

16:01.925 --> 16:04.265
The second big trend has been the increase in

16:04.265 --> 16:05.345
diversity in America.

16:05.885 --> 16:08.945
And, that is linked with immigration as well

16:08.945 --> 16:10.825
as just natural increase of,

16:10.935 --> 16:13.025
more diverse populations in the United States.

16:13.405 --> 16:15.785
So in 1970,

16:16.125 --> 16:18.865
we had 83% non-Hispanic white.

16:19.255 --> 16:21.825
That is to say the country was pretty homogeneously

16:22.585 --> 16:24.585
non-Hispanic white people.

16:25.495 --> 16:28.845
Today it's 58% non-Hispanic white

16:29.315 --> 16:33.165
with almost 20% Hispanic, 12% African American,

16:33.585 --> 16:35.765
6% Asian American, 5% other.

16:35.995 --> 16:37.485
It's a much more diverse nation.

16:38.545 --> 16:40.485
And there is research that seems to show

16:40.875 --> 16:42.725
that trust is tribal.

16:44.295 --> 16:48.755
If your tribe, is not that much represented

16:48.815 --> 16:52.515
or you feel it's in decline, you worry that the other tribes

16:53.175 --> 16:55.955
are going to maybe take advantage of you

16:55.975 --> 16:57.275
or do things you don't want them to do

16:57.275 --> 16:58.715
with the society in which you live.

16:59.455 --> 17:02.875
And that kind of distrust, might be part

17:02.875 --> 17:04.195
of the roots of what we're seeing.

17:04.695 --> 17:06.835
Uh, and it's disturbing,

17:06.975 --> 17:09.195
as it's based upon a presumption that people

17:09.215 --> 17:11.475
who don't look like you are somehow untrustworthy.

17:11.775 --> 17:13.875
But there certainly seems to be evidence that

17:13.875 --> 17:15.395
that's a mechanism that's going on.

17:15.895 --> 17:17.675
And then there's finally the whole issue

17:18.095 --> 17:19.795
of polarization of trust.

17:20.295 --> 17:21.635
Um, that's a separate thing

17:21.635 --> 17:23.315
because the, the forces I've talked about

17:23.315 --> 17:25.755
so far would affect everybody and everything.

17:26.255 --> 17:27.555
Um, the ethical

17:27.555 --> 17:32.195
and moral scandals, the, change in inequality

17:32.255 --> 17:34.355
and the change in, diversity

17:34.705 --> 17:36.795
that would affect trust across the board.

17:37.615 --> 17:39.585
The polarization is something different.

17:39.765 --> 17:41.945
Why do republicans like some institutions

17:42.165 --> 17:43.905
and Democrats, other institutions?

17:45.275 --> 17:47.115
I think here probably the reason is

17:47.265 --> 17:50.605
that we've had a change in our politics from a politics

17:50.605 --> 17:52.045
that focused on economics.

17:52.625 --> 17:55.365
The New Deal cleavage it, it used to be called,

17:55.545 --> 17:58.605
and it was about business versus labor, basically.

17:58.945 --> 18:02.325
Um, now we have another dimension of politics.

18:02.705 --> 18:05.965
Um, and that dimension has to do with,

18:05.965 --> 18:08.685
issues like abortion, prayer in the schools,

18:09.345 --> 18:11.085
gay rights and so forth.

18:11.085 --> 18:12.725
These, these are identity issues,

18:13.265 --> 18:17.925
and these identity issues are hard to deal with in that.

18:17.925 --> 18:20.205
Whereas with economic issues, you can split the difference.

18:20.955 --> 18:23.525
Okay, you get two bucks, I get two bucks.

18:23.905 --> 18:25.085
That's, that's, that's fair.

18:25.585 --> 18:27.605
Um, with abortion, you can't do that.

18:28.315 --> 18:29.975
And we've seen that recently with Dobbs.

18:30.495 --> 18:35.425
Actually, the road decision did in fact split things up into

18:35.425 --> 18:37.065
three trimesters and tried to find

18:37.295 --> 18:39.585
what many people felt was a terrible legal decision.

18:40.325 --> 18:43.105
But it was pragmatically sort of a sensible way to go.

18:43.605 --> 18:44.985
It split the difference.

18:45.375 --> 18:48.305
Well, that's been rejected by the Supreme Court now.

18:48.645 --> 18:51.465
And increasingly we see groups that are unwilling

18:51.805 --> 18:52.945
to split the difference.

18:53.325 --> 18:54.985
And that's both on the left and the right.

18:55.285 --> 18:57.145
The basic issue with immigration.

18:57.205 --> 18:58.825
Now, we've seen how people are just

18:58.825 --> 19:00.065
unwilling to split the difference.

19:00.195 --> 19:01.865
Compromise is just not possible.

19:02.285 --> 19:05.265
And as a result, I think these issues have led

19:05.265 --> 19:06.825
to polarization, partly

19:06.985 --> 19:08.705
'cause the institutions, for example,

19:09.045 --> 19:12.145
the Republicans Trust are on one side of these issues.

19:12.485 --> 19:15.505
And the institutions that Democrats trust are on the,

19:15.605 --> 19:17.745
are seen to be on the other side of these issues.

19:17.965 --> 19:21.145
And that, I think has caused the polarization that we see.

19:21.485 --> 19:23.825
My biggest concern is America's losing its

19:23.825 --> 19:25.185
ability to get things done.

19:25.885 --> 19:30.555
Um, we saw that recently, in the Congress,

19:30.695 --> 19:32.035
with respect to immigration.

19:32.495 --> 19:34.595
Uh, and in fact this bizarre situation

19:34.595 --> 19:38.155
where performative politics, the impeachment

19:38.615 --> 19:42.235
of the Secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro,

19:42.355 --> 19:44.635
Mayorkas, took precedent.

19:45.105 --> 19:47.315
Even though the impeachment was gonna go nowhere,

19:47.545 --> 19:50.715
it's not gonna be, agreed to by the Senate,

19:50.725 --> 19:52.315
which is run by the Democrats.

19:52.655 --> 19:54.875
Um, it's actually not even clear

19:54.875 --> 19:58.155
that it's based upon any real issues that are impeachable.

19:58.175 --> 20:01.635
And in fact, Republicans have themselves said, no, it's not.

20:01.635 --> 20:03.475
And that's one reason why the attempt

20:03.495 --> 20:05.315
to impeach Mayor Orcas actually failed,

20:05.415 --> 20:08.315
at least on the first attempt as of this moment.

20:08.815 --> 20:12.515
Um, but instead, an attempt to really solve the problem,

20:13.625 --> 20:16.905
a bill, a piece of legislation also failed.

20:17.445 --> 20:20.625
And it failed. In fact, as soon as it came out, as soon

20:20.625 --> 20:24.105
as it was, offered to the House of Representatives,

20:24.135 --> 20:26.465
basically people rejected it probably

20:26.465 --> 20:28.065
before many of them had even read it.

20:28.605 --> 20:31.825
And so, a lack of willingness to solve problems.

20:32.005 --> 20:34.545
Now that's the Congress, and that's the government.

20:34.545 --> 20:36.585
That's not these non-political institutions.

20:37.445 --> 20:38.665
But I think the same sort

20:38.665 --> 20:42.185
of problem is seeping into those nonpolitical institutions.

20:42.695 --> 20:46.625
I've mentioned some police medicine, science,

20:47.555 --> 20:48.595
religion and so forth.

20:49.135 --> 20:51.835
Um, I think that's really worrisome.

20:51.855 --> 20:55.115
If those institutions can't solve our societal problems,

20:56.225 --> 20:58.115
then we're gonna continue to have problems.

20:58.525 --> 20:59.555
We're not gonna solve them,

21:00.135 --> 21:01.515
and we're not gonna be able

21:01.515 --> 21:03.435
to move forward in ways that we need to.

21:03.975 --> 21:07.195
Um, and one of the reasons why I'm especially worried about

21:07.195 --> 21:10.475
this is that it turns out that

21:11.825 --> 21:13.605
you even find the following to be true.

21:13.665 --> 21:15.405
We did a survey, my, my co-author

21:15.405 --> 21:18.885
and I in 2019, of a random sample of Americans.

21:20.055 --> 21:22.115
We asked them, would you want your kin

21:22.135 --> 21:26.515
or your friends to be involved with a journalist?

21:26.575 --> 21:27.915
So to marry a journalist,

21:27.935 --> 21:29.595
to have friends who was a journalist?

21:30.145 --> 21:33.915
Well, republicans said they didn't want their canner friends

21:34.515 --> 21:37.115
Republicans said they didn't want their canner friends

21:38.035 --> 21:39.375
to be involved with a journalist

21:39.795 --> 21:41.175
or somebody in higher education.

21:42.375 --> 21:44.815
Democrats said they really didn't want their kind

21:44.815 --> 21:46.455
or friends to be, have close connections

21:46.645 --> 21:48.935
with those in police, the military

21:49.355 --> 21:50.735
or religious institutions.

21:51.485 --> 21:53.095
Well, that's very worrisome

21:53.125 --> 21:56.735
because again, we see that not only is there polarization,

21:56.835 --> 21:59.575
but it's leading to actual, at least professions,

22:00.235 --> 22:04.575
if not actual actions, where people say, I don't want my son

22:04.575 --> 22:06.455
or daughter to marry an ex.

22:06.915 --> 22:08.535
Uh, and that's worrisome.

22:09.035 --> 22:11.655
Uh, we want institutions that have people

22:11.875 --> 22:13.295
of all sorts in them so

22:13.295 --> 22:14.495
that we have different perspectives

22:14.495 --> 22:15.975
within those institutions.

22:16.275 --> 22:19.375
Um, and in fact, Republicans are even more worried about

22:19.375 --> 22:22.775
their can or friends becoming involved with a journalist

22:23.325 --> 22:25.855
than with an atheist or a gay person.

22:26.655 --> 22:29.515
That's pretty stunning given what we know about Republicans.

22:30.135 --> 22:32.835
So as a result, it's not clear

22:32.855 --> 22:35.835
how we're gonna solve problems when we have institutions

22:36.265 --> 22:40.675
that are so split, that are so divided

22:41.645 --> 22:43.185
and therefore not trusted,

22:44.165 --> 22:46.225
and perhaps ultimately incapable

22:46.565 --> 22:50.385
of solving problems like epidemics, like problems

22:50.385 --> 22:52.185
of police brutality,

22:52.245 --> 22:54.305
and many other problems that the society faces.

Trust Decline in American Institutions Explored

00:00:00 - I was an academic administrator for 12 years. I was Dean of the Goldman School, which is behind me here. And, I was very concerned with the decline in trust in higher education. And so I went and collected some data on that. But as I collected the data, I got data on other institutions, and I was shocked to find out there'd been decline in confidence in essentially every institution. But the military, I knew that was true for government. that's been a longstanding truth. and so that was not a surprise, but the fact that it's occurred in what I call non-political institutions, some of which,
00:00:33 - but are not meant to be political in the sense of, politicized, that we still had decline in faith in those. And then the second thing I noticed was that there was polarization in that faith. So that Democrats had one view of some institutions and Republicans had a decidedly different view. And those two things decline in trust and polarization made me worry. and the reason is this institutions are the way we get stuff done in society. They're really hard to build. And as an academic administrator, I learned that,
00:01:06 - Goldman school is a good one, and well regarded, and we're very lucky for that. but it's hard to build them. And the notion that somehow there'd been such a decline in trust in them, and polarization in trust worried me in that we get things done in society through our institutions, and if we don't trust them, how are we gonna get things done and especially get things done as a society together. And we'll talk more about that as we go along, because that's really, I think, a big issue.
00:01:40 - and co-author eventually, Brad Kent, Thomas, Brad Kent. we put together a data set that included Gallup polls, Harris polls, and I think called the General Social Survey. and we ended up with over 165,000 respondents, asking questions about confidence or trust in Go Government and other institutions over 50 years, all the way back to the early 1970s. And so we have a very, very long data set, and we can look at trends over time.
00:02:11 - the executive, the president, the executive branch versus the president, somewhat distinct, Congress and the Supreme Court. and there we found that there's been tremendous decline in trust in all of them. Most precipitously for, Congress, but more recently for the Supreme Court. And in fact, even more recent data that we've just getting into, now shows that with Dobbs, the decision about abortion, that there's been really quite a decline in trust in the Supreme Court.
00:02:42 - There's four institutions related to the economy, business and labor, the sort of two major pieces of our business corporation sector, and then banks and Wall Street. and there again, you find that trust has declined, quite a Bit over time, and especially for Wall Street and banks. And then there's seven institutions related to knowledge and information production. these are things like higher education, science,

Trust Decline in Society's Key Institutions

00:03:15 - these institutions provide us with the knowledge and information we have in our society. and there again, you've seen, especially for the press, for journalism, for television news, precipitous declines in trust of them. Science is still pretty trusted, but it's starting to show declines. And more recently, more precipitous declines. So that's worrisome. And higher education was doing fine until maybe 10, 20 years ago. And then it started to show,
00:03:44 - So all of the information producing institutions are seeing declines. And then there's three related to what we call norm enforcement, the kinds of institutions that say what our norms and our morals and our ethics should be in a society. And that's religion, police, and the military. and there for police and, for, religion, we've seen declines in trust. Don't see it for the military. if you go way back to the 1960s and dig up some old questions, you find out
00:04:17 - Then there was Vietnam that really brought it to a very low E and it's really increased since then. for some reason, the military has escaped this decline in trust that has affected every other institution. And then finally, two, related to professional services. law and health, the medical sector. This covers just about everything in society. There's some that are left out, arts and entertainment, public utilities, philanthropy, agriculture,
00:04:47 - that we have questions about pretty much cover the gamut of what you'd want to cover for studying a modern society. If you don't trust an institution, then it does, it lacks some of the power that it needs, the legitimacy that it needs so that it can actually undertake changes. So, for example, if you don't trust the police, then it's gonna be hard to have an organization in your local area that provides safety to people because you don't trust the institution which is given that job.
00:05:20 - and to accept the findings such as climate change that science has come up with. And so it'll be hard to actually do something about the change in climate. and similarly with every other institution, medicine, if you don't trust medicine, it's gonna be hard when an epidemic comes along, to listen to the medical professionals and to do what they say you should do, such as get vaccinations. When I first, started looking with these questions, I was very worried about that, whether they were just fluff.
00:05:50 - you find out that they go up and down, in ways that really are quite predictable and that are based upon events that occur. And the also the characteristics of the people responding. So in terms of events, the military is the one where it's most clear. so when we had the successful, war in the Mideast in 1991 or so, the first mid East War, first ball, a Gulf War, that we did quite well at, we went in very quickly, things went well.

Declining Trust and Rising Polarization in Institutions

00:06:22 - you see the same thing after nine 11 rally round. The flag effect, just what you'd expect. Then you see trust going down with the Iraq War in Afghanistan, wars becoming mired. And then finally, when you get the, a surge in Iraq, which was successful, you see trust in the military, military going up, and then you see that with every other item. banks trust in them go down when there are bank failures. So the late 1980s, there were a series of savings and loans, bank failures, trust in banks went down, wall Street.
00:06:53 - or so, small recession, then the.com recession, that trust in Wall Street goes down. same thing in 2000 7, 8 9, when we had the Great Recession trust in banks. 'cause remember there were a lot of bank failures there and trust in Wall Street goes down. And finally you find that as unemployment goes down, trust in labor goes up. As GDP goes up, as we get more prosperous, trust in business goes up. So for all those reasons, you have
00:07:23 - because the questions seem to be capturing changes in ways that make sense. just from a a priority perspective, this is the thing that actually has me more worried even than distrust In institutions. Americans have historically been distrustful of governmental institutions. We were founded as a nation that was distrustful of a king. and so it's not surprising that we're distrustful of government, and it arguably is a good thing, that we're worried about authoritarianism and, about governments, which get too powerful.
00:07:55 - that's maybe not a bad thing because in fact, maybe institutions aren't trustworthy. And if they're not trustworthy, then our trust should go down in them. And given the scandals, for example, in the Catholic Church scandals in some of the Protestant churches and other things, you can imagine that trust and religion should go down, and on and on. We, we can give many examples of where there's been events that have maybe made us less trustworthy. Also, the society's becoming more educated. And there's a lot of evidence that suggests that one
00:08:27 - make students question. That's what we're supposed to do. And when we make them question things, they question institutions as well. So all of that sort of makes sense, and at least is okay, maybe, although you wonder if trust gets solo, that it could be really a problem for society, like I indicated earlier. But what really worries me is polarization and trust. Suppose half the society thinks an institution's doing just great, police are doing great. No problems say Republicans by and large,
00:09:00 - police are really doing a bad job. We have to rethink the police and do policing in an entirely new way. Well, it's gonna be very hard to do anything to solve the problems of the police if you've got such differences of opinion about whether there's even a problem, much less what the solution to that problem should be. So we've got a lot of polarization where we find there are some institutions that are trusted by Democrats and some institutions that are trusted

Polarization and Trust in American Institutions

00:09:30 - So Republicans trust big business. That's not a surprise. Banks and Wall Street, and Democrats trust unions. Well, that's a historic artifact of the New Deal Coalition. And going back before that, Republicans basically became the party of business, at least in the 1920s, if not before. So that's not a surprise. But we also find that Republicans trust the norm enforcing institutions, religion, the military, and police,
00:10:02 - On the other hand, Republicans distrust higher education, science, journalism, TV news, and Democrats trust those institutions. Science, for a long while was trusted more by Republicans than Democrats, but now is distrusted more by Republicans than by Democrats. And in fact, there's a growing gap between Republicans and Democrats with respect to trust for science. So, and then by the way, in Intel recently, health
00:10:34 - but now especially with Covid, healthcare system is less trusted by Republicans than it used to be. And therefore, there's a growing gap, polar, a polarization there as well. so what worries me is if you have polarization, how are you gonna solve problems? And how are you gonna get these institutions reformed in ways they need to be reformed, when in fact, Republicans and Democrats can't agree as to whether, even if there's a problem, much less what the solution is,
00:11:06 - you can get legitimacy. one is it can be bestowed upon you by an, an authority. So for example, when a corporation gets a corporation charter that's bestowing on that corporation, some legitimacy says they can do business within the society. the trouble with that is that increasingly government's not very trusted. the second way is you can do things that are culturally appropriate. So for example, the mafia doesn't do things that are culturally appropriate, so it's not much trusted.
00:11:36 - like run your hospital in the way people expect you to run your higher education institution the way people think you should and so forth, then you're going to get some legitimacy and ultimately trust. The third thing you can do is make sure that not only do you run it in a way that makes Sense to the society, and so you're trustworthy, but you also have a process, a a, a set of norms within that institution that makes sure that it does it in an ethical and moral fashion.
00:12:07 - If Bernie Madoff comes along and takes, advantage of a lot of people and a lot of people lose their money, then the financial system isn't much trusted. You have trouble. If you're the Catholic church and you have pedophile priests, people aren't gonna trust an institution that allows that kind of behavior to go on. so that's, that's the third way, ethical and moral operation of your institution. And then the fourth way is you can just perform well. You know, if you do such a good job,

Legitimacy Challenges for Institutions Today

00:12:38 - people actually sometimes excuse you for all sorts of other bad behaviors. So big business often gets away with, things like actually sourcing, material or, products from abroad that maybe even use child labor or that involve corruption in terms of bribes and things like that. but they perform so well. They provide such a good product. It's such a low price that people excuse them. Now, there's not a limitless possibility for that. At some point it may catch up with you, as we've seen
00:13:08 - but those are the four ways you get legitimacy. Government gives it to you. culturally, you do the right thing ethically and morally. You do the right thing, but finally you just perform so well that people say you're great. the trouble is, is that each of those have difficulties these days. as I said, government's not much trusted. And so it's hard to get much, legitimacy by the fact that government has said you're our police department.
00:13:40 - 'cause culturally there's been changes in notions of how things should be done. Police departments are suffering from this because there's been a cultural change in how people think policing should be done. moral and ethically, that's a problem because so many institutions have suffered, partly because of the post-Watergate press, which has really gone into these institutions and looked for corruption. probably a good thing, trying to keep them, doing things correctly, but nevertheless meant
00:14:10 - and moral lapses. And then finally, performance, is sometimes very hard to do. It's hard to perform well, and it's not even clear. That always works. The Biden administration, for example, has performed very well by most political scientists, at least standards. They've passed a lot of legislation. The economy is in very good shape by any standard. and yet there Biden himself is not got much confidence, of the American public. so there seems to be a problem even
00:14:41 - and that brings us to polarization. And that part of the problem seems to be the tremendous polarization we have. A bunch of things seem to be happening. one is That there's all this increased scrutiny of institutions that goes beyond what we used to have before the 1970s, when institutions often got a pass. Certainly the Catholic church, for example, obviously got a pass for very bad behavior, which had been going on for a long time. And that's true of many other institutions. So first of all, the, the press no longer allows them
00:15:12 - of the bad behaviors they used to get away with. So that may explain some of the decline in trust. second of all, there seemed to be forces in American politics, events, things happening, that cause people to have less trust in general of one another and of institutions. And the two big things are inequality has increased. in the 1970s, the top 1% of the wealth distribution had 25% of the wealth. That's a lot. But they now have 40%.

Trust, Inequality, and America's Polarized Diversity

00:15:46 - now they got 20% of the income. so Americans look at this and they say, these institutions are ripping us off. And so inequality is one reason. It seems to me, we haven't proven that link, haven't done the research, but it seems very likely that it's important. The second big trend has been the increase in diversity in America. And, that is linked with immigration as well as just natural increase of, more diverse populations in the United States. So in 1970,
00:16:19 - That is to say the country was pretty homogeneously non-Hispanic white people. Today it's 58% non-Hispanic white with almost 20% Hispanic, 12% African American, 6% Asian American, 5% other. It's a much more diverse nation. And there is research that seems to show that trust is tribal. If your tribe, is not that much represented
00:16:53 - are going to maybe take advantage of you or do things you don't want them to do with the society in which you live. And that kind of distrust, might be part of the roots of what we're seeing. and it's disturbing, as it's based upon a presumption that people who don't look like you are somehow untrustworthy. But there certainly seems to be evidence that that's a mechanism that's going on. And then there's finally the whole issue of polarization of trust.
00:17:21 - because the, the forces I've talked about so far would affect everybody and everything. the ethical and moral scandals, the, change in inequality and the change in, diversity that would affect trust across the board. The polarization is something different. Why do republicans like some institutions and Democrats, other institutions? I think here probably the reason is that we've had a change in our politics from a politics
00:17:52 - The New Deal cleavage it, it used to be called, and it was about business versus labor, basically. now we have another dimension of politics. and that dimension has to do with, issues like abortion, prayer in the schools, gay rights and so forth. These, these are identity issues, and these identity issues are hard to deal with in that. Whereas with economic issues, you can split the difference.
00:18:23 - That's, that's, that's fair. with abortion, you can't do that. And we've seen that recently with Dobbs. Actually, the road decision did in fact split things up into three trimesters and tried to find what many people felt was a terrible legal decision. But it was pragmatically sort of a sensible way to go. It split the difference. Well, that's been rejected by the Supreme Court now. And increasingly we see groups that are unwilling

Polarization and Institutional Distrust in America

00:18:53 - And that's both on the left and the right. The basic issue with immigration. Now, we've seen how people are just unwilling to split the difference. Compromise is just not possible. And as a result, I think these issues have led to polarization, partly 'cause the institutions, for example, the Republicans Trust are on one side of these issues. And the institutions that Democrats trust are on the, are seen to be on the other side of these issues. And that, I think has caused the polarization that we see. My biggest concern is America's losing its
00:19:25 - we saw that recently, in the Congress, with respect to immigration. and in fact this bizarre situation where performative politics, the impeachment of the Secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro, Mayorkas, took precedent. Even though the impeachment was gonna go nowhere, it's not gonna be, agreed to by the Senate, which is run by the Democrats. it's actually not even clear
00:19:58 - And in fact, Republicans have themselves said, no, it's not. And that's one reason why the attempt to impeach Mayor Orcas actually failed, at least on the first attempt as of this moment. but instead, an attempt to really solve the problem, a bill, a piece of legislation also failed. And it failed. In fact, as soon as it came out, as soon as it was, offered to the House of Representatives, basically people rejected it probably
00:20:28 - And so, a lack of willingness to solve problems. Now that's the Congress, and that's the government. That's not these non-political institutions. But I think the same sort of problem is seeping into those nonpolitical institutions. I've mentioned some police medicine, science, religion and so forth. I think that's really worrisome. If those institutions can't solve our societal problems, then we're gonna continue to have problems.
00:21:00 - and we're not gonna be able to move forward in ways that we need to. and one of the reasons why I'm especially worried about this is that it turns out that you even find the following to be true. We did a survey, my, my co-author and I in 2019, of a random sample of Americans. We asked them, would you want your kin or your friends to be involved with a journalist? So to marry a journalist, to have friends who was a journalist?
00:21:34 - Republicans said they didn't want their canner friends to be involved with a journalist or somebody in higher education. Democrats said they really didn't want their kind or friends to be, have close connections with those in police, the military or religious institutions. Well, that's very worrisome because again, we see that not only is there polarization, but it's leading to actual, at least professions,

Polarization and Trust in Modern Institutions

00:22:04 - or daughter to marry an ex. and that's worrisome. we want institutions that have people of all sorts in them so that we have different perspectives within those institutions. and in fact, Republicans are even more worried about their can or friends becoming involved with a journalist than with an atheist or a gay person. That's pretty stunning given what we know about Republicans. So as a result, it's not clear
00:22:52 - that are so split, that are so divided and therefore not trusted, and perhaps ultimately incapable of solving problems like epidemics, like problems of police brutality, and many other problems that the society faces.

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