In the wake of Covid-19 when most of the countries were forced to impose lockdown, Sweden took a different approach relying on people to monitor themselves hoping its high trust society and people will listen to government. Instead of lockdown, Sweden perceived that social distancing is a matter of self-regulation and people will use their own judgment to move in the right direction. Citizens were instructed to use their judgment, and to take individual responsibility within a framework that rested on mutual trust, rather than top-down control.
Sweden’s approach was neither a success nor a failure as such. The deadly nature of the virus proved that the ‘trust’ failed to stop the spread of the virus as social distancing norms were not adhered to the extent it was required as restaurants and bars had remained open. It was not exactly people’s lack of trust in the government but the force and intensity of the virus. Notwithstanding the success or failure of the ‘Swedish model’, it needs to be ponder upon if the government measures are enough to confront such a situation if people do not have trust in government and are not prepared to listen and adhere to the self –regulation? The major difference in Sweden’s approach is trust in the population. An expert has observed that “what it has done differently is it is very much relying on its relationship with its citizenry. It really has trusted its own communities to implement that physical distance.”
Arnold Kling in an article published in EcoLog says, “My idea of a high-trust society differs from that of many elites. Elitist journalists think that a high-trust society is one where we trust the mainstream media. Elitist politicians and activists think that a high-trust society is one where we trust legislators, regulators, and experts to exercise broad authority. In contrast, I believe that a high-trust society is one in which processes ensure that elites are subject to checks and accountability. It is particularly important for legislators, regulators, and experts to have their authority limited and their accountability assured”.
Peter Turchin article titled “Is Social Trust a Cultural Trait?” says that periodic social surveys indicate that generalized trust behaves just as we would expect a cultural trait to behave. National-level studies show that each surveyed population is characterized by a mixture of people holding different beliefs about whether others can be trusted. When the World Values Survey (wvs) asks Swedes whether most people can be trusted, more than 60% answer yes. In Italy only about 30% do so, and in Romania a mere 7%. Another study, the European Social Survey (ESS), asks respondents to rate their trust in politicians on a ten-point scale. Dutch averaged 5.4, the Poles 3.1 and the French and Germans in between one in eight and Bulgarians gave their politicians a zero”. (https://evolution-institute.org)
“Trust,” political scientist Eric Uslaner has written, “is the chicken soup of social life.” Over the last two decades, social scientists have repeatedly suggested that good things tend to happen in societies where people tend to trust each other — they have stronger democracies, richer economies, better health, and they suffer less often from any number of social ills. Pew Global Attitudes survey highlighted, the degree of trust in societies varies considerably around the world. Moreover, while the survey finds that social trust is not strongly correlated with our measures of democracy or economic performance, it is strongly correlated with views about two other important issues: crime and corruption. In countries where people generally trust one another, there are fewer worries about crime or corrupt political leaders.
That trust, combined with adequate administrative controls and smooth flow of information, is need of hour while loosening lockdown restrictions. Are we suffering a huge trust-deficit when it comes to the question of key institutions- the government, the judiciary, the media and the corporate vis-à-vis the citizenry? What is rooted in our culture values when comes to the issue of collectivism over individualism? Trust is central factor to facilitate the collective action for mutual benefit. Governments alone cannot fight the unprecedented challenge of Covid-19; trust on the part of all stakeholders is the key.
