the institutional trust paradox in bangladesh

The Institutional Trust Paradox in Bangladesh

Steinar Askvik & Ishtiaq Jamil

Published online: 8 November 2013# Springer Science+Business Media New York 2013

Abstract This paper maps institutional trust in Bangladesh and analyzes to what extentcitizens perceive public institutions to be trustworthy. According to a number of expertevaluations, public and political institutions in Bangladesh do not stand out as verytrustworthy. Yet, despite such expert evaluations, recent survey data indicate thatpopular trust is quite high in certain major institutions such as the parliament and thecentral government. Since it is misplaced, the high level of popular institutional trustpresents a paradox. It implies some kind of blind or naive trust, which may bedysfunctional for the emergence of a democratic governance system.

Keywords Trust . Trustworthiness . Public institutions . Bangladesh

Introduction

This paper maps levels of citizen’s trust in public and political institutions inBangladesh. In particular, we want to address the gap between, on one hand, howexperts on governance issues assess the trustworthiness of public and politicalinstitutions in Bangladesh, and, on the other hand, how ordinary Bangladeshis perceivethese institutions in terms of trust. While most experts rate the trustworthiness of publicinstitutions as low, recent survey data suggest that ordinary people in Bangladesh tendto express a high level of trust in such institutions. Insofar as the latter is a validobservation, the gap between expert judgements and popular perceptions suggests acase of what trust specialists have referred to as ‘blind trust’ (Sztompka 1999). Thismay indicate a governance paradox in Bangladesh: the level of popular trust is farabove what the experts would predict from their assessments of institutionaltrustworthiness.

Public Organiz Rev (2013) 13:459–476DOI 10.1007/s11115-013-0263-6

S. Askvik (*) : I. JamilDepartment of Administration and Organization Theory, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norwaye-mail: [email protected]

I. Jamile-mail: [email protected]

Significance of Trust

Citizens’ trust in public institutions is an indication of how public organizations aremanaged and how successful the democratic governance is (Askvik 2007; Askvik andBak 2005; Bouckaert et al. 2005; Kim 2005:611; Mishler and Rose 2001; Van de Walleand Bouckaert 2003). According to Van de Walle (2013:3), “high levels of public trustare regarded as evidence that the government performs effectively, efficiently anddemocratically”. In contrast, “low trust is seen as an indicator that the governmentmust be doing something wrong or that public services do not deliver, and is a reasonfor worry because low trust is seen to be associated with a decrease in civic behaviorand undesirable voting behavior” (e.g., Nye et al. 1997, cited in Van de Walle 2013).

It was Robert Putnam’s (1993:167) study of government reforms in Italy which setthe agenda of trust as an important topic and a cross cutting issue spanning severalacademic disciplines. Putnam introduced the concept of social capital, which refers to‘features of social organization’ that can facilitate cooperation amongst people. Onesuch critical feature is interpersonal trust. In his 1993 study, Putnam argues that in those(basically northern Italian) regions where the implementation of the reforms was moresuccessful, interpersonal trust and social capital were more extensive. In the southernregions this was not the case; here the dominant trend was a social culture of distrustemanating from clientelism, and it made cooperation across families difficult.

Bangladesh is often cited as a low trust society (Jamil 2002). Its institutions ofgovernance have largely been hierarchic, elitist and exclusive; these traits reflect a longhistorical tradition, as most of the institutions were built during the British colonialperiod. Therefore, in a culture of distrust, cooperation is seldom spontaneous andrequires extensive legal apparatuses to control and sanction the implementation offormal contracts and public policies. Such apparatuses do not come without costs,and in a low trust society, the transaction costs may be considerably higher than in asociety where individuals tend to trust each other.

Trust in Public Institutions

Trust in public institutions implies that citizens have positive expectations aboutmembers of such institutions and assume that they follow procedures that will producebeneficial outcomes for themselves and for society at large. When citizens trustinstitutions, they may believe in the normative idea of an institution, that is, that ademocratically elected parliament would be the best way to govern a society, or that anindependent court system would secure a fair and neutral interpretation and applicationof the laws adopted by the parliament.

An important approach to institutional trust focuses upon the trustworthiness ofinstitutions: here we refer to the mechanisms for selecting and regulating the behaviourof institutional agents, so that they act in accordance with certain role responsibilities(Levi 1998). Bureaucratic arrangements which promote competence and honestyamong civil servants are examples of mechanisms for producing a trustworthy civilservice. More generally, truth-telling, promise-keeping, fairness and solidarity areclaimed to be vital values for enhancing institutional trustworthiness (Offe 1999:73).

460 S. Askvik, I. Jamil

The assumption is that when institutions appear trustworthy, people will tend to trustthem. A critical question is to what extent judgements of trustworthiness are based onvalid observations. As we shall see, this may not always be the case, and sometimesassessments of trustworthiness may be misplaced and based more on guesswork thanon reliable information.

In the two following sections, we shall discuss how institutional trust relates toBangladesh. We will address two main questions: (i) to what extent do publicinstitutions in Bangladesh appear as trustworthy, and (ii) what is the current patternof institutional trust in Bangladesh?

The Low Trustworthiness of Institutions in Bangladesh

In order to discuss the trustworthiness of public institutions in Bangladesh we shall usethe assessments of experts, and we shall adopt a model of institutional trustworthinessproposed by Kim (2005). Building on various definitions of trust, he has identified fivemain dimensions of institutional trustworthiness.

Credible commitments: Do institutional actors honour their commitments?

Benevolence: Do they want to do good to citizens?

Honesty: Are representatives of institutions telling the truth?

Competency: Do institutional office holders have the necessary knowledge andskills?

Fairness: To what extent are they dealing with everybody in an equal manner?

We use these dimensions as a point of departure for discussing the trustworthiness ofinstitutions in Bangladesh.

Commitments are not Very Credible According to Kim and others, an importantdimension of trustworthy public institutions is that they make credible commitments.To appear trustworthy, institutional actors need to honour their agreements and beconsistent in the way they implement policies. The police should observe standardoperating procedures and not break the law when dealing with crime. Hospitals shoulddemonstrate that they pursue the objectives of national health policies and that they areconcerned about their patients and really take an interest in their health.

With regard to Bangladesh, we may ask to what extent public institutions respectand enforce the law and observe their own rules and regulation. White (1999) hasclaimed that Bangladesh stands out as an example of a weak state: it is unable topenetrate society and regulate social relationships. To give some examples; Bangladeshhas great problems in enforcing a number of laws, and according to a recent report fromthe World Bank (2010:71), the ability of the country’s court system to deal with civilcases concerning contracts and property rights is frequently restricted. The state’scapacity to tax citizens is very limited, even though laws mandate that all citizens mustpay taxes from their incomes. More generally, the independence of the administrativebranch from the political/executive branch of the state is very limited, and politicians

The Institutional Trust Paradox in Bangladesh 461

tend to continuously intervene in order to influence administrative decisions. It hastherefore been claimed that the weak Bangladeshi state is unable to “guarantee the basicrights of any who do not have the power to seize them for themselves” (White1999:319).

According to Wood (2000), Bangladesh’s public institutions follow only to a limitedextent the logic of formal organizations, where official behaviour is separated frompersonal interests and determined by a bureaucratic rationality. In the case ofBangladesh, important decisions in public organisations stand out as transactionsbetween patrons and clients who exchange services on the basis of personal interests.Thus, weak state structures and strong patron-client relationships explain why the ruleof law in Bangladesh stands out as somewhat precarious.

Benevolence may be Wanting Another dimension of trustworthiness is benevolence.Citizens are inclined to trust public institutions when they believe institutionalrepresentatives want to do well to them. Thus, educational institutions are perceivedto be trustworthy when teachers are seen as helping their students and motivated byvalues that transcend what is specified through their work tasks. More generally, civilservants appear trustworthy when they demonstrate that they want to promote the well-being of people even when rules and regulations are less favourable.

According to observers, however, the opposite is normally the case in Bangladesh.Civil servants are more interested in pursuing their personal interests than those of thepublic, and they will frequently charge extra money for their services. Zafarulla andSiddiquee (2001) have claimed that public sector corruption is pervasive inBangladesh. They identify different forms. One such form is the practice of tadbir(lobbying, persuasion), which implies that citizens must pay kickbacks to obtain certainservices from relevant authorities: e.g. birth and death certificates, a passport, filing acomplaint with the police, getting a driving license, registering a vehicle, gettingadmission into public hospitals, etc. (Jamil and Haque 2005). Similarly, applicantsfrequently have to bribe influential individuals to get a job done in publicadministration, or to get a transfer from one job to another, as when a teacher wantsto move to another school. Knox (2009:120) refers to survey data on petty corruptionfrom 5,000 households, of which as many as 42 % reported that they had paid bribesfor “receiving services from different sectors” during the twelve months of 2007. Lawenforcement agencies such as the police appeared as the most frequent source ofcorruption, and almost everyone who had been in contact with such agencies hadexperienced some kind of corrupt practice.

Similarly, the morals of public officials in dispensing their duties are considered tobe rather low. They are seen as unresponsive to public needs. Part of the problem hereis that the cost of violating the rules is low; when service users feel they have beentreated wrongly, they lack official mechanisms for complaining (Knox 2009; Zafarullahand Siddiquee 2001:470).

Honesty is Frequently Restricted A third dimension of trustworthiness concernshonesty. If representatives of public institutions are observed not to be honest, this willcreate distrust among the public. When civil servants are behaving in dishonest waysand frequently seen as lying and not telling the truth, the public will come to distrustthem. Conversely, truth-telling will strengthen the trustworthiness of institutional actors


(Offe 1999:74). Members of professions are respected and trusted insofar as they aresupposed to be carriers of true information. To a large extent, public employees are alsomeasured against such standards.

The comprehensive existence of corruption is, of course, a form of dishonestywhereby office holders hold back information about the true reasons behind theirdecisions and actions. In particular, political corruption means that high levelpoliticians hide their motives and incentives—during elections, lofty promises bypoliticians are a common phenomenon. Various types of clientelism also imply thatpatrons and clients collude and seek to hide any evidence that they have businesstogether.

Another problem (as noted by Sarker 2009) is weak accountability mechanisms.These are due to the weak role of the parliament and the judiciary. The parliament doesnot properly control and scrutinize the public administration. In proper democracies, acritical role played by the opposition to examine the control exercised by the rulingparty. This could be called parliamentary overseeing. However, in Bangladesh, themain opposition party frequently boycotts the parliament; as such, it does notparticipate in parliamentary committees responsible for overseeing the government’sactivities (Moniruzzaman 2009). Also the judicial control of administration remainsineffective, especially of the lower judiciary (Sarker 2009:1109). According to oneobserver (Quadir 2010:70), the ruling party at any time during the three lastgovernments did not want to improve transparency and assist the opposition partiesin strengthening ‘watchdog agencies’ such as the three important legislative overseeingcommittees. For the same reason, neither did they want to make the Anti-CorruptionCommission effective. Such circumstances restrict the possibilities of truth-telling andtrustworthy behaviour in public affairs.

Competency is Incomplete Competency of office holders refers to the knowledge andskills needed to perform the tasks allocated to public institutions. For suchorganizations to perform properly, organizational routines need to be in place tocoordinate the activities of individual actors.

Zafarulla and Siddiquee (2001:478) have criticized the lack of competence amongstpoliticians: they do not have the knowledge or the experience to control the civilservice. Senior bureaucrats are more educated and knowledgeable and one wouldassume they should be in charge of their areas of expertise; it is also expected thatthey could even protect themselves and their colleagues against interference fromcorrupt government ministers. However, bureaucracy is now more fragmented andpolarized along political party lines. Loyalists—irrespective of their competence andskill—are more favoured and given bureaucratic jobs than are non-loyalists, who areside-lined despite their competence. Furthermore, Wood (2000) has mentioned that thepromotion system of the civil service in Bangladesh is not always based on merit, andsometimes promotions may follow from patron-client relations where political loyaltiesare more important than skills and technical knowledge. This grates against the idealsof a merit-based bureaucracy, and it favours those who have the more powerfulconnections. Institutional incapacity is marked by the inability of the Bangladeshigovernment to uphold authority in different spheres of society. Indiscipline is visiblein all sectors. The government’s inability is also found in legislating and implementinglaws and in holding public officials accountable.


Fairness is Partial Finally, fairness implies that citizens are treated on an equal basisaccording to publicly acknowledged principles. The judiciary, the court system, otherpublic institutions, and government agencies are expected to make impartial decisionsand not to favour any particular group.

One component of fairness concerns the impact of social class and stratification. Towhat extent are poor people treated as less important than the wealthy? Anothercomponent is patron-client relationships: do citizens have to engage in a specialrelationship with public office holders in order to receive certain services? Kabeer(2003) emphasizes how different groups in Bangladesh vary in relation to what rightsand privileges they have access to through the state and the legal system. To someextent inequalities are built into the legal system itself: they partly result from the non-enforcement of certain laws. Despite the constitutional provision of equal rights to alland the various government regulations ensuring security and safety in the workplace,it is always the poor sections of society who remain excluded from claiming legitimaterights. Recent examples are the lack of human security caused by a factory fire inDecember 2012, and the collapse of a building housing garment industries in April,2013. This disaster killed hundreds of poor garments workers, mostly women, whoworked in abysmal, deplorable, and hazardous conditions. These people, and many likethem, have been denied a minimum standard of workplace safety and security, not tomention a due salary.1

Justice can to a large extent be bought by those who can pay the necessary bribesand have the right contacts. Poor people, on the other hand, do not have the resourcesand the relevant networks, and they tend to be excluded from many of the rights that,according to the law, should follow from their citizenship.

From a study of the activities of the NGO ‘NijeraKori’, Kabeer (2003:28–29)illustrates some of the challenges poor people face when they try to stand up for theircitizens’ rights. One such example is service delivery in the health sector, where healthofficials at a local hospital charged illicit fees from the poor. No public authoritiesintervened to stop this practice. Only through a campaign initiated by the said NGOwas the practice discontinued. The same challenge of discrimination and denial ofrights is often faced by minorities and women in Bangladesh.

Survey Observations of Institutional Trust

From the above discussion, we may infer that even though observers do not alwaysadopt the term ‘trustworthiness’ as such, they still assess the trustworthiness of publicand political institutions in Bangladesh to be rather low. The discussion, however, isbased on expert assessments, not on whether ordinary citizens actually trust suchinstitutions. In this part of the paper we turn to ordinary citizens: to what extent do

1 Nazma Akhter, president of Sommilito Garments Sramik Federation (United Garment Workers’ Federation)said, “It seems that workers [in garment factories] have no rights and dignity in Bangladesh”. The BangladeshGarment Manufacturer Export Association (a trade body representing garment manufacturer and exporters)had utterly failed to protect the workers, she said. “It [the BGMEA] formed committees just for show. None ofits reports has ever blamed factory owners for any accidents”, said Akhter (The Daily Star, 1 May, 2013 http://www.thedailystar.net/beta2/news/owners-probe-owners-fault/ [Accessed 1 May 2013]


http://www.thedailystar.net/beta2/news/owners-probe-owners-fault/

http://www.thedailystar.net/beta2/news/owners-probe-owners-fault/

the majority of Bangladeshi citizens actually trust or distrust their public and politicalinstitutions? Following the experts’ assessments, one would expect popular trust to below, yet as we shall see, there is no immediate link between the experts’ observations oftrustworthiness and the trust patterns reported by ordinary citizens.

In order to answer the question of popular trust in public institutions, we use datafrom a recent survey carried out amongst 2,000 persons in Bangladesh.2 Here therespondents were asked how much confidence they have in various institutions. Wecompare the results from this survey with the responses to a similar question posed bythe World Values Surveys in Bangladesh in 1996 and 2006 (see Askvik and Jamil2007). In addition, we supplement responses to the trust question with responses tosome other question from the same survey.

The method of sampling is presented in Appendix 1. Although the sample wasintended to be representative of all citizens above the age of 18, it turned out to beheavily biased towards literates. While various official statistics estimate 45 % of thetotal population in Bangladesh to be illiterate, in our sample, only 1 % was illiterate.According to those in charge of interviewing, it was difficult to get access to illiteraterespondents since they did not have any idea about the issues raised in the interview.Hence we should be careful not to generalize our findings to the latter group.

Responses to the Trust Question

Table 1 presents the main results, using the Trust Survey 2009 as the starting point.Respondents were asked how much confidence they have in various institutions. In thecolumn to the right, for each institution, the proportion of ‘institutional trustors’ (thosewho indicate either a great deal plus quite a lot of institutional confidence) is presented.On the basis of the survey carried out in 2009, institutions have been ranked fromhighest to lowest in terms of how many respondents indicate that they trust eachinstitution. Thus, at the bottom of the table, for the police, the proportion of trustorsin 2009 was 16 %. This was the lowest proportion among all institutions rated in thatsurvey. At the other end of the scale, we note that the higher judiciary stands out with aproportion of 91 % trustors. Table 1 also provides comparative results from the WVSsurveys for 1996 and 2002, yet this is only for selected institutions since the 2009survey included more institutions than those covered by the WVS surveys.

In general, we note that despite some variations, citizens’ trust in public institutionsin Bangladesh is on the average quite high compared with other national surveys. Thisis particularly so for certain key institutions such as the higher judiciary, the army, theparliament, and the central government. The high levels of institutional trust from the2009 survey, however, are to a large extent compatible with the results from the WVSsurveys of 1996 and 2002, where the observed levels of confidence in certaininstitutions were very high also. For instance, in an international perspective, for the

2 This study is based on a country-wide door-to-door questionnaire survey including 2,000 householdsconducted in 2009 in Bangladesh. The method was personal interview with a person who is 18 or above ina household. After selecting 21 districts from 6 divisions (Dhaka, Chittagong, Rajshahi, Khulna, Barisal, andSylhet) and deciding the number of interviews from a district, the sample was again divided on the basis ofupazila (or sub-district), and respondents were randomly selected from households from 43 upazilas. Sampledistribution is presented in the appendix.


2002 WVS survey, Bangladesh was ranked on the top, as number four out of 48countries with regard to confidence in the national government (Inglehart et al. 2004,cited by Askvik and Jamil 2007).

Based on the results for 2009, we may classify the institutions of Table 1 into fourgroups, according to how much confidence they attract.

(i) In the group of most trusted institutions, we find, in addition to the higherjudiciary, the army, the parliament, and the election commission. All of theseattract the confidence of more than 87 % of the respondents. We may assume thatthe trusted position of the higher judiciary results from the way it traditionally hashandled its tasks, as a separate and independent branch of the state (Askvik 1995).More than once in its history, it has been capable of ruling against the governmentin critical cases, even though a challenge has been the political appointment ofjudges supporting the party in power (Quadir 2010:71). Furthermore, despite itsundemocratic approach, the army has gained trust and respect from its interventionduring 2007–8 to solve the destructive national power struggle. Probably also itswillingness to restore democracy and return to civilian rule has contributed toraising its popular standing. Notably, the level of confidence in the army hasincreased from 57 to 89 % between 1996 and 2007. The prominent position of the

Table 1 Institutional trust in Bangladesh 1996–2009. Percent who respond either’a great deal’ or ‘quite a lot’of confidence

WVS 1996(N=1,500)

WVS 2002(N=1,500)

Trust survey2009(N=2,000)

Higher judiciary 75a 91

The army 57 75 89

Parliament 85 89 88

Election commission (EC) 87

Office of the deputy commissioner (District collectorate) 81

Lower courts 79

Central government 81 87 78

Office of the UNOb 77

Office of the union Parishad 59

Anti-corruption commission 54

Political parties 71 79 52

NGOs 52

Civil service 80 96 50

The police 39 53 16

a The 1996 question was about confidence in the judiciary in generalb Upazila Nirbahi Officer (chief executive officer of a sub-district)

Question: I am going to name a number of organizations and institutions. For each one, could you tell me howmuch confidence you have in them: is it a great deal of confidence, quite a lot of confidence, not very muchconfidence, or none at all?


parliament, however, is more surprising, especially given the claim that it has beenmore or less dysfunctional and ineffective during recent years. According toMoniruzzaman (2009), the pervasive rivalry between the two major parties(Awami League and Bangladesh National Party) has inhibited the parliament fromperforming its tasks. As such, it has not functioned as the proper centre of aparliamentary democracy, and most of the time the opposition has boycottedparliamentary activities. Furthermore, the ruling party has bypassed and side-lined the parliament on important issues. Still, the parliament holds a significantamount of institutional confidence, and it has remained more or less at the samelevel through all the three survey years. Also the election commission seems tohave a high standing, which suggests that it probably is perceived as neutral andnon-partisan.

(ii) In a second group we find the office of the deputy commissioner, the lower courts,the central government, and the office of the UNO. Also these institutions attracthigh proportions of trustors, that is, between 81–77 %. Still, while the highercourts are recognized for their autonomy vis a vis the executive, this has to a lesserextent been the case for the lower courts. Until 2007 they have been under thecontrol of the executive branch and various government ministries who haveappointed and promoted judges and magistrates. This has provided members ofthe ruling party with an opportunity, via the government ministries, to exert theirinfluence at the cost of the rule of law (Quadir 2010:71). Hence, given that thelower courts are less trusted than higher courts, this may be due to suchcircumstances. Confidence in the central government refers to the politicalleadership of the executive branch of the state. The results from the 2009 surveysuggest that the central government is somewhat more contested than the politicalcentre of the legislative branch, that is, the parliament.

(iii) A third group of institutions are less popular, with proportions of trustors rangingbetween 59–43 %. This group includes the office of the union parishad, the anti-corruption commission, the NGOs, the political parties, and the civil service. Thisis a mix of different institutions. For instance, the civil service refers to theadministration of the public sector in total, while the office of the union parishadis limited to the administrative branch of a local council found in about 4,500unions all over Bangladesh. The political parties and the trade unions include avariety of different organizations, which in many cases are competing amongstthemselves for positions and power (sometimes very intensively alongBangladesh Nationalist Party-BNP and Awami League lines). Notably, Table 1reveals that the civil service has dropped from a confidence level of almost 100 %in 2002 to 50 % in 2009. This indicates a significant decline in the popular trustof those employed in public administration during recent years. Although ofsomewhat lesser magnitude, also the political parties have experienced anoticeable decline in institutional trust during the same period, suggesting thattheir support among ordinary citizens is waning. The persistently hostileconfrontation between the BNP and the Awami League has taken its toll andremoved most of the positive attitudes people might have towards the politicalparties. It has also been claimed that people have lost their confidence in the civilservice due to its increased politicization as an instrument of the ruling party.Senior civil servants in alliance with politicians reportedly have misused public


funds for personal gain, and public bodies such as the public service commissionhave been reduced to an instrument of the ruling party (Quadir 2010:70).

(iv) In the fourth group we find only one institution, the police, which definitelyappears as the least trusted institution of all. Only 16 % of those asked in 2009indicate that they trust the police in Bangladesh. This is far below the trust ratingsof the civil service, and it is also far below corresponding ratings of the police for1996 and 2002. This very negative development suggests that between 2002 and2009, the trust level of the police has dropped by 37 percentage points. Thesenumbers generally confirm what other observers previously have noted, namely,that the police department is depicted as the most corrupt department and that thecitizens of Bangladesh “have developed fear and wariness about the policebecause of the excesses they perpetrate on them and the way they abuse power”(Zafarullah and Siddiquee 2001:470). However, this is also how the policetraditionally have been characterized: as a rather unreliable institution whichfrequently is accused of torture and ill-treatment of prisoners and which alsofails to intervene to protect the life of citizens when political opponents of theruling government have been attacked by political enemies (Askvik 1995). Thelow level of trust in the Bangladeshi police is quite opposite of what tends to bethe case in many other countries. For instance, in a number of establisheddemocracies such as the Nordic countries (Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway,and Sweden), the police are among the most trusted institutions in society(Inglehart et al. 2004).

As noted above, the main pattern is to have high levels of confidence in many of thekey public and political institutions such as the higher judiciary, the army, theparliament and the central government. In a comparative perspective, theseBangladeshi institutions appear as highly trusted. On the other hand, from our reviewof the professional literature, we inferred that Bangladesh is often cited as a highlycorrupt country with poor governance systems. Its political and administrativeinstitutions are associated with the widespread abuse of power, the misappropriationof public funds, weak accountability structures, and the strong influence of partisaninterests on public policy and service delivery.

How can we explain the contradiction between the picture painted by the survey datafrom experts and the viewpoints provided by ordinary citizens in door-to-door surveys?

Popular Perceptions of Civil Servants and Politicians

In order to further check the validity of the above results on institutional trust, we havealso examined how respondents rate two important groups in the political system: civilservants and politicians. The data were collected through the same survey as theinstitutional trust data, but they add information on how respondents assess certaincharacteristics that may be linked to judgements of the trustworthiness of civil servantsand politicians.

We asked our respondents how they would characterize civil servants according to anumber of statements. The characteristics in Table 2 (below) have been sortedaccording to their mean score of respondents’ agreement. In general, it is interesting


to note that as we move from the lowest to the highest mean of agreement on variousstatements, we are also moving from positive to negative characteristics. Hence, itseems as if people are more inclined to agree on negative characteristics than onpositive ones. At the two opposite end points, we find the ‘lowest agreement’ withthe statement that civil servants treat all equally (Mean=2.05) and the ‘highestagreement’ with the statement that civil servants act on tadbir (Mean=3.40). Themajority of respondents therefore agree partly or strongly to ‘negative statements’about civil servants, while only a minority of respondents agree to ‘positive statements’about civil servants being friendly, reliable, helpful, prompt, and efficient.

From the response pattern presented in Table 2, it seems like civil servants are notperceived to be very trustworthy. If we compare this with the ideal characteristics oftrustworthiness presented in the previous section, we note that many respondentsperceive them to be corrupt and favouring their own personal interests at the cost ofthe rule of the law and principles of equality. These are behaviours which do not attracttrust amongst ordinary citizens. Thus they support the perception of the civil serviceand officials as not very worthy of trust. Of course, this is only the main trend. Manyrespondents also hold positive views of civil servants and agree that they deserve to betrusted. In fact the picture is quite mixed.

As noted, in addition to civil servants, we asked respondents about their views onpoliticians. Towhat extent did they view politicians in similar ways as they perceived civilservants?We also asked some questions about politics and the political system in general.

From Table 3, we observe that there are definitely a number of critical voices. Only30% agree to the statement that politicians do what is right most of the time, while 70%disagree. 27% agree that most politicians are competent people who knowwhat they aredoing, but 63% disagree with this kind of statement. A majority think that politicians donot take their election pledges seriously, and just do what they want to do. Many also

Table 2 Popular perceptions of civil servants. Percentage distribution of those who strongly and partly agree,and mean score for each characteristic

In general, civil servants (are) Partly agree +strongly agree

Mean

- Treat all equally 29 2.05

- Friendly 35 2.24

- Reliable\ trustworthy 22 2.24

- Helpful and responsive 37 2.29

- Disrespectful to citizen 56 2.64

- Prompt and Efficient 68 2.69

- Not fully aware of their duties\ responsibilities 61 2.72

- Corrupt 79 3.11

- Serve their personal Interests instead of that of the citizen 78 3.11

- Difficult to get access to 81 3.16

- Nepotism 89 3.30

- Act on tadbirs\ suparish 93 3.40

Question: I am now reading a number of statements on civil servants and public services. To what extent doyou agree or disagree with these statements?


claim that the country is run by a few big interests. Only 30 % disagree that the presentpolitical system is rotten, which means 70 % agree more or less to this statement.

In general we may conclude that the opinions which survey respondents express arequite critical of politicians. And they do not match properly with the trust people seemto have in the parliament and central government (as noted in Table 1). So we havesome kind of mismatch in how people respond to the different questions. On the onehand, they express strong trust in central political institutions such as the Parliamentand central government; on the other hand, they are very critical of the group ofpoliticians who make up the membership of such institutions. Hence it seems as ifrespondents make a distinction between politicians and the institutions in question.

Discussion of Findings

Our findings indicate a gap between how certain expert observers assess thetrustworthiness of public and political institutions in Bangladesh and how ordinarypeople express their trust in such institutions. Expert observers claim that public officeholders are not very committed to institutional policies, and in general theirbenevolence toward citizens is wanting; their honesty is restricted, their competencyis incomplete, and their fairness is partial.

From such observations we should predict that popular institutional trust is ratherlow in Bangladesh. Yet this is not the case. On the contrary; our survey data reveal thattrust in certain major institutions such as the parliament and the central government isexceptionally high compared with other countries, and much higher than what wewould predict from the experts’ assessments of institutional trustworthiness. This seemslike a paradox.

Still, there are some exceptions to these high levels of institutional trust. The policedo not garner much trust, and our data suggest that in Bangladesh, trust in the police

Table 3 Popular opinions on politics and politicians. Percentage distribution of those who strongly disagreedand quite disagreed and mean score on each statement

Strongly disagree +quite disagree

Mean

Politicians do what is right most of the time 70 2.24

Most of the politicians are competent people, who know what they are doing 63 2.35

When I think of the system of government in Bangladesh, I feel like an outsider 51 2.50

There is no point in voting; parties do what they want to do anyway 38 2.77

Generally speaking this country is run by a few big interests 39 2.83

People like me have no possibility of influencing politics 44 2.88

The present political system is rotten 30 2.90

Politicians are more corrupt 15 3.27

Politicians serve their own interests rather than those of the public 14 3.27

Most politicians promise a lot, but do not do anything 14 3.34

Question: What is your opinion on the following statements? Respondents were given 4 options—1 “disagreecompletely, 2 “quite disagree”, 3 “quite agree”, and 4 “agree completely”


dropped significantly between 2002 and 2009. We also noted that trust in the civilservice and the political parties, although still quite high from an internationalperspective, has dropped drastically for the same period. In addition, when we supplydata about how survey respondents perceive civil servants and politicians, the picturesthey provide are a lot more critical. A majority tend to disagree that civil servants arereliable and trustworthy, and they rather agree that members of the civil serviceprimarily serve their own interests instead of those of the citizens. Similarly, a majorityof respondents do not think that politicians are competent and do what is right most ofthe time.

Such response patterns suggest that the high levels of institutional trust inBangladesh can be doubted, and probably trust in the parliament and the centralgovernment do mean something different to people than trust in politicians as a group.Nonetheless, given the critical assessments by the experts, the high level of trust inmany public and political institutions needs to be explained. Below we discuss somealternative interpretations of this paradox.

First, we may, of course, question whether there actually is a gap between expertassessments and popular trust judgements. On the one hand, the experts may bemistaken in their observations, or on the other hand the survey data about institutionaltrust may be flawed (even though WVS data from 1996 and 2002 presented in Table 1reveal high trust in institutions). With regard to the experts’ assessments; they may bebased on certain standards that differ from what most Bangladeshi citizens consider tobe appropriate and relevant when they make their trust judgements. Thus it may beclaimed that the above concept of trustworthiness proposed by Kim rests on a liberal,idealized and normative conception of what will make people trust public institutions.When Bangladeshis submit their trust evaluations, they do not ground their argumentson such criteria as civil servants’ policy commitment, benevolence, honesty,competence, or fairness. They will rather base their judgements on whether they feelthe institutions in question act in accordance with certain rituals and traditionalstandards. In such a perspective, the gap may be explained as resulting from differentconceptions of what constitutes a trustworthy institution.

An alternative option to consider is whether the survey data for the said periodactually present a valid picture of institutional trust patterns in Bangladesh. As we notedabove, the respondents are skewed in favour of those who can read and write. Mostilliterates declined to participate in the survey and there is definitely a possibility thatthe proportion of institutional trustors is lower amongst the illiterates. However, Ali andHossain (2006), from their study of popular expectations of government in Bangladesh,have concluded differently (see also Hossain 2009). They were also quite surprised bythe positive attitudes towards government that they observed amongst poor people. Aliand Hossain claim that respondents were given many opportunities to criticize thegovernment during the discussions they organized, and in order to attract genuineresponses, the researchers emphasized that the organization they represented had noaffiliation with the government system. Still, their main interpretation was that of highpolitical trust in government institutions.

From the above, we are inclined to infer that there is actually a gap in how expertsand ordinary people evaluate the trustworthiness of public and political institutions inBangladesh. How can we explain such a gap, and in particular, that popular trust inpublic institutions is so high? At the outset Ali and Hossain noted that historically poor


people have tended to be quite tolerant of the different political regimes in Bangladesh.Despite political neglect of the interests of the poor, and despite significant inequalitiesin how the state has dealt with poor and rich people, there has been very little evidenceof revolt and resistance. Most Bangladeshis are god-fearing and accept their presentcondition as a fact of destiny. Ali and Hossain (2006:20) ask why this is so. From thefocussed group discussions they organized, they found that government was frequentlyseen as “a good thing”—as a provider of welfare to the poor. To some extent the primeminister and the national government were positively contrasted with representatives ofthe local community and local government institutions. In addition, participants in thediscussion groups demonstrated extensive knowledge of the history and structure ofgovernment, such as the role of the prime minister and parliament, the civil service andthe political parties. Much of the information and knowledge were acquired via massmedia, exposure to election campaigns, and personal experiences of trying to accessdifferent types of government services. They were also familiar with the function ofelections in democratic politics and their own role as voters who could influence theformation of the government.

Hossain (2009), in a more recent analysis of the same research, emphasizes even morestrongly that poor people (at the time of their data collection in 2005) actually had somegood reasons to trust government. Although mass poverty in Bangladesh has persistedover the years, government by 2005 had made some progress in alleviating poverty,expanding primary schooling and improving the delivery of health services. This has beenthe case particularly after 1990 (Hossain and Osman 2007). The poor tend to acknowledgethese government contributions, and that is also why they present a positive portrait ofcentral political institutions. Thus the gap between experts and most people may beexplained by policy performance: despite a number of deficiencies, people tend to trustpublic and political institutions because such institutions have performed well andcontributed to economic progress and better living conditions during recent years.

Another interpretation, inspired by Haque andMohammad (2012), suggests that highinstitutional trust in Bangladesh may result from a national culture of large powerdistance. According to Hofstede et al. (2010:60), power distance refers to the waymembers of a specific culture deal with power, authority, and social inequality.Bangladesh stands out as a case of large power distance insofar as deference to authorityis an important social value. Haque and Mohammad (following Jamil 2007:4) linkrespect for authority and acceptance of hierarchy to the samaj tradition in rural areas ofBangladesh.3 The samaj tradition denotes the societal norms and values which haveregulated village life in large parts of India and Bangladesh over centuries. According tothis tradition, people should respect the head of their family as well as other senior andhigh status persons. According to Jansen (1990, cited by Jamil 2007:10), Bangladeshstand out as a society which is “obsessed about hierarchy in interpersonal relations”, andto poor people it may be critical to demonstrate compliance and know how to behave inrespectful ways when interacting with relevant patrons.

Hence the hypothesis proposed is that a culture of large power distance andhierarchism may explain the high levels of popular trust in public and politicalinstitutions in Bangladesh. Large power distance implies that citizens are inclined toaccept inequalities in different social contexts, and in particular that “the less powerful

3 Samaj literally means society in Bangla language.


members of institutions and organizations within a country expect and accept that poweris distributed unequally” (Hofstede et al. 2010:61). Such acceptance also affects howcitizens view state authorities: in large power distance societies, most people have beensocialized to accept and respect those holding state power almost regardless of how theyuse that power. The hypothesis about large power distance fits with a more generalconception of Asian paternalism and authoritarianism. For instance, in a discussion ofConfucian values in Asian political culture, Fukuyama (1998, cited by Chang and Chu2006:262) claims that people are born with “duties to a series of hierarchically-arrangedauthorities beginning with the family and extending all the way up to the state”.

As of now, we do not have any convincing, single, most important explanation forwhy political trust is so high in Bangladesh. However, the discussion above can belinked to a more general discourse in the political trust literature, which discussesinstitutional and cultural approaches to the question (Mishler and Rose 2001; Wonget al. 2011). The institutional approach emphasizes the impact of institutionalperformance as a source of political trust. The cultural approach views political trustmainly as a result of societal values and norms. Thus when Hossain, above, interpretshigh political trust as resulting from successful government efforts to alleviate masspoverty in Bangladesh, this would be an example of an institutional approach. And theinterpretation of large power distance as another source of such trust would illustrate thecultural approach. In political science there is an on-going debate about which approachhas more explanatory power. It illustrates that both conceptual as well as methodologicalissues are involved and need to be addressed in order to deal with competing hypotheses.

Concluding Remarks

In this article we have discussed the concept of trust in public and political institutionsin Bangladesh. Our findings indicate a gap between observed institutionaltrustworthiness and reported popular trust patterns. According to the expert literatureon public and political institutions in Bangladesh, agents of such institutions appear lesstrustworthy. Expert observers claim that public office holders are not very committed toinstitutional policies, their benevolence toward citizens is wanting, their honesty isrestricted, their competency is incomplete, and their fairness is partial.

In most of the literature, institutional trust is interpreted as something positive fordemocracy. Democracy is also based upon distrust through a system of control whereopposing groups can monitor the activities of their opponents (Bouckaert et al. 2005). Iftrust becomes too high, systems of control may not be very effective, and office holdersmay have more opportunities to abuse the power they hold. When opposing politicalparties are not in a position to control each other, when the legislative body does notmonitor the executive branch of government, and when the judiciary and civil societydo not penalize the violation of rules by public office holders, a political culture ofnegligence, arbitrariness, corruption, clientelism, and nepotism is allowed to develop.Too much trust is sometimes referred to as blind or naive trust (Van de Walle and Six2013:3; Sztompka 1999:108). It is dysfunctional and hollow out checks and balances,and it will have a negative impact on the emergence of a democratic governancesystem. This may be the governance paradox of high institutional trust and lowtrustworthiness of institutions in Bangladesh.


Appendix 1

Methods of Sampling for Trust Survey, 2009

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Table 4 Socio-demographic distribution of respondents compared with the Population Census Data for 2001in Bangladesh. Percentage

Socio-demographicfeatures

Respondents inBangladesh (our sample) %

Population data of Bangladesh2004, 2008, 2009, 2010a %

Gender Female 48 49

Male 52 51

Education Master degree or higher 3 2

Graduate 20 4

Secondary 64 28

Primary 8 66

Literate 99 55

Illiterate 1 45

Age Groups 61 and above 1 10

46–60 8 16

31–45 44 32

18–30 48 42

Religion Muslim 79 89

Hindu 16 9

Buddhist 4 1

Christian .4 .3

Others .1 .1

Total 2000 Ca. 144 million

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Steinar Askvik is a professor at the Department of Administration and Organization Theory, University ofBergen. His research interests include theories of institution building, social and political trust, organizationallearning, and management in public administration.

Ishtiaq Jamil is associate professor at the Department of Administration and Organization Theory, Universityof Bergen. His research interests include administrative culture, public policy, multi‐level governance, andtrust in public and political institutions.


the institutional trust paradox in bangladesh

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