Exploring the Dynamics of Public Trust in Government Policies at the Local Level
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This review integrates evidence on how global health crises and multilevel governance affect public trust in government policies. Following Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines, a search in Scopus (Social Sciences field, English-language articles) yielded 13 publications (2013–2026) from ten countries and one multi-country study: China, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Pakistan, multi-country, South Korea, Hong Kong/China, Moldova, Singapore, Australia, and Indonesia. These studies included qualitative, quantitative, and case study designs; therefore, synthesis was carried out narratively using a thematic-interpretive approach. Two main mechanisms have emerged. In crisis governance, trust is shaped by increases in performance-based trust and citizen emotions, which are mediated by informational and socio-cultural environments. In multilevel governance, trust is influenced by the attribution of central–local responsibility, fiscal decentralization, institutional design, and vulnerability to disinformation targeting specific levels. The synthesis indicates that the attribution of responsibility in multilevel contexts helps explain why increases in performance-based trust during crises are stronger at the local level
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