Resumo

LOPEZ ROBLES, Adalberto. The Decline of Institutional Trust in Mexico: Political Performance or Culture?. Rev. mex. opinión pública [online]. 2023, n.34, pp.39-57.  Epub 05-Fev-2024. ISSN 2448-4911.  https://doi.org/10.22201/fcpys.24484911e.2023.34.84413.

This study examines theories of political trust in Mexico based on data from The AmericasBarometer survey from 2010 to 2021. These theories hold that fluctuations in trust depend on contextual factors. The institutional performance model emphasizes variables such as the economic situation of the country, the capacity of governments to combat corruption, provide services to citizens and improve public security. For its part, socio-cultural theory is based on interpersonal trust and social activism as explanatory factors, since it maintains that trust in institutions is the result of socialization processes. Ordinary least squares (OLS) regression models were developed using the STATA statistical package and it was found, for the Mexican case, that the variations in the levels of political trust are explained to a greater extent by the evaluations that citizens make of the performance of the institutions. This work demonstrates the superiority of the performance model over the socio-cultural approach in explaining institutional trust. With these results, this research aims to contribute to the theoretical and empirical discussion on the explanatory factors of political trust.

Palavras-chave : Political trust; institutional performance; social activism; interpersonal trust; Mexico.