Webinar 1: What will it take to rebuild trust in government?
Webinar concluded - Friday 1 April 2022
Trust is an important enabler for the success of policies that depend on behavioural responses from the public.
Trust is the foundation for the legitimacy of public institutions, and for a functioning democratic system. For public policies that depend on compliance from citizens, trust is a critical enabler.
With the backdrop of the pandemic, impending climate disaster, racial injustice and other key issues - many are losing trust in government. How can we rebuild this trust? In our first webinar, we discussed the need to listen and respond to those experiencing complex challenges, in a way which dismantles inequitable power dynamics, builds trust and lasting relationships, and enables community-driven change.
Speakers:
Naja Nelson (Associate, CPI)
Marcus Stewart (Co-Chair, First Peoples’ Assembly of Victoria)
Facilitated by:
Simon Kent (Deputy CEO, Thought Leadership, ANZSOG)
Materials Hub
To take our webinar further, we’ve collated a wide range of material exploring legitimacy, and rebuilding trust in government. Scroll below to explore:
The Webinar
Watch the webinar, and read more about what our community is saying.
Explore our audience's observations, resources and questions, posted in the webinar group chat.
The Theory
Dive more deeply into this topic by learning more through blogs, articles and reports.
The OECD’s Directorate for Public Governance has a hub focusing on Trust in Government - it includes data on OECD countries’ trust across various institutions, the drivers of trust, and a host of further data and research. Their webinar also offers a great overview on what it takes to rebuild trust.
CPI’s report, Finding a more human government, explores what legitimacy means to people, and how it could be strengthened - through interviews with citizens from around the world
In a 2020 article, CPI’s John Burgoyne wrote about Why government legitimacy matters in North America, and the team’s learnings over the course of their work in legitimacy. CPI’s Katie Saviano also looks at lessons about trust and legitimacy across sectors in her article
Trust in government increased during the Covid-19 pandemic in Australia and New Zealand in 2020, and in their article, Shaun Goldfinch, Ross Taplin and Robin Gauld discuss why
Webinar speaker, CPI’s Naja Nelson’s article discusses Legitimacy & COVID-19: Why rebuilding trust in government is imperative to responding to and recovering from the pandemic
In the article How humility can help governments regain trust, Juha Leppänenargues that humility can address the three core challenges that need to be addressed to rebuild trust and revitalize democracies: a sense of detachment, fragmentation, and purposelessness
In the report, “Building Trust in Government through Civic Engagement”, Saki Kumagai and Federica Iorio unpack the concept of trust, discuss the relationship between trust and citizen engagement, and discuss how to earn trust. Make sure to read to the end, where they include examples of political trust surveys.
In the report Rebuilding trust in government, Deloitte Insights examine four signals that can help improve citizen trust and engagement
In the article Social Capital: What, Why, and How we can use it as a tool for empowerment, CPI’s Rebecca Ierardo shows how communities have built and can leverage social capital, to empower those impacted by institutional racism, inequality & injustice
Our World in Data’s 2016 deep dive into Trust discusses historical data on trust, as measured by attitudinal survey questions (estimates from surveys asking about trusting attitudes)
“Politicians need to listen up before they speak up – and listen in the right places”. Jim Macnamara describes the need for greater empathy to build trust, and how the changing nature of political participation and social media doesn’t necessarily mean more listening
In her article, Civic Learning: A Way to Build Government Legitimacy, Nia Hill discusses an approach to building government legitimacy that’s often not discussed
ANZSOG summarises an excellent panel around The Griffith Review issue, Matters of Trust in the article A matter of trust: how public servants can restore faith in democracy
In Practice
We’ve collated case studies and material to illustrate what these ideas look like in practice, and offer frameworks and tools to support experimentation with a similar approach in your work.
CPI’s Earned Legitimacy Learning Cohort saw four cities and counties take action to address past harms and rebuild legitimacy with marginalised communities. The Impact Report details how over 10-weeks, governments worked to dismantle inequitable power dynamics and enable community-driven change.
Partecipedia is a global network and crowdsourcing platform focused on public participation and democratic innovations. Lots of interesting examples of how governments and public servants across the world are rethinking listening, a critical enabler when building trust
In the report “Learning to Listen Again”, CPI outlines example questions to spark deeper community engagement, considerations for online engagement, and broader lessons learned from the listening engagement process
In “Are You Really Listening”, Adam Bryant and Kevin Sharer share how leaders can actively create a more expansive “listening ecosystem" to build trust, through seven practical steps
Today’s Problems, Yesterday’s Toolkit, written by Professors Beth Noveck and Rod Glover, argues that the key to improving trust in government is to change the way people in government work, and pinpoints the skills and training programs required to do so. There’s also a summary of the article by ANZSOG.
Building trust in government: Innovations in governance reform in Asia is a 2010 report examining case studies of governments building trust across different Asian countries
CPI’s Program Director for Government Legitimacy in North America, Jorge Fanjul, shares the tragic experience that inspired his belief in the need for government to earn trust from residents, in his moving article
The OECD’s report, Drivers of Trust in Public Institutions in Finland, uses a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods to examine the key determinants of trust in government, the local government and the public administration in Finland. Overall, it finds that responsiveness of public services and reliability of policies are key determinants of trust in institutions in Finland
From ‘Water’ to ‘Why’: New Orleans’ Resident Engagement Journey highlights a CPI project that proactively communicated with residents, and met them where they were at, in order to rebuild trust
Join our community
Our Community of Practice is a forum for conversations over the course of the webinar series, and a great way to build new relationships with like-minded people, passionate about reimagining government. Content in webinars will be brought to life, through events, workshops, conversations, and networking opportunities.
Register below, and join us as we reimagine government.