ABSTRACT

The focus of this study is the political trust implications of territorial reforms, approaches to territorial reform, and the effects of the mobilisation of political-territorial collective identities. We focus on the political trust effects of political-territorial mobilisation grounded on territorial reforms, and of voluntary and forced structural reforms. The case examined is that of Norway, a country characterised by high levels of trust before a recent county reform. Utilising four survey waves from 2013 to 2019, we measure trust in national politicians both pre- and post-reform, giving us a quasi-experimental design. The findings indicate that political trust was not affected by whether the reform was forced on counties or they accepted it voluntarily. However, political trust was negatively affected by forced structural reforms in combination with regionalism, i.e., mobilisation of political-territorial collective identities. This finding provides new insight about how territorial reforms may affect political trust.

摘要

本研究的重点是领土改革对政治信任的影响、领土改革的方法以及政治领土集体身份动员的影响。我们关注基于领土改革的政治领土动员以及自愿和强制结构改革的政治信任效应。研究的案例是挪威，该国在最近的县级改革之前就具有高度信任的特点。利用 2013 年至 2019 年的四轮调查，我们衡量了改革前后对国家政治家的信任度，为我们提供了一个准实验设计。研究结果表明，政治信任并不会因为改革是强制县还是自愿接受而受到影响。然而，强制结构改革与区域主义（即调动政治领土集体认同）相结合，对政治信任产生了负面影响。这一发现为领土改革如何影响政治信任提供了新的见解。