Germans lose trust in social institutions
Erosion in support for bodies ranging from army and church to trade unions and police
Germans are losing trust in their country’s social institutions, according to a new survey that highlights an unusually broad erosion in support for bodies ranging from the army and the church to trade unions and the police.
“We have been asking Germans for more than a decade how much trust they have in relevant social institutions. Never before have we seen such an across-the board decline as we measured this year,” said Manfred Güllner, the director of the Forsa polling group, which published the survey on Monday.
Of the 26 institutions featured in the survey, 22 showed a decline in public trust. Germany’s armed forces, the Bundeswehr, performed particularly badly, suffering a year-on-year fall of 13 percentage points. Schools declined by 10 percentage points. The police were once again the most-trusted institution in the country, but fell 5 percentage points compared with last year.
A Forsa poll looking at the level of trust in political institutions such as parliament and political parties will be published next week, but Prof Güllner said the trend was broadly similar. “The great majority of political institutions has also seen a fall in trust.”
Some of the findings from Monday’s poll are likely to reflect the fact that the affected institutions came under especially sharp scrutiny and criticism in 2018. The Roman Catholic church, for example, made headlines repeatedly in connection with sexual abuse scandals. It saw a 9 point decline in trust while the pope’s rating fell 20 points, the biggest decline of any institution measured in the poll.
Germany’s military, meanwhile, drew frequent negative publicity over the past year, amid reports detailing the underfunding of the armed forces and the poor state of its equipment. A 2018 parliamentary report noted that the Bundeswehr was in “dramatically bad” shape, pointing out that critical weapons systems such as submarines and transport aircraft were at times unusable.
Germany’s schools have also been exposed to extensive critical coverage in recent years, most notably for the poor state of their buildings and general infrastructure and — at the end of last year — in connection with a political row over how best to equip students with digital tools.
“There is a general sense that things are not working as they should,” said Prof Güllner. “According to everyday experience, it seems that problems are piling up and that the state has lost control over many of these areas.”
The loss of trust was particularly marked among supporters of the far-right Alternative for Germany, according to the Forsa poll. Only 13 per cent of AfD supporters said they trusted the press, for example, compared with 41 per cent for the broader population.