Avenues of possible policy responses

How should European policies react to decreasing trust? Building on the signals for and drivers of change and drawing on the respective implications and impacts of eroding trust, authors of this report engaged in a number of 'light' scenarios or future options in the different issue areas based on trend impact analysis. The final section of this chapter concludes on some avenues of possible policy responses following from this analysis along four lines: create greater responsibility of actors; increase transparency and participation for higher legitimacy of political action; consider regulation as trust-enhancing tool; study the role of trust in society.

3.1. Create greater responsibility of actors

Responsibility of actors is core to keeping a high trust-level in society. Hermerén concludes for the world of science that quality criteria need to be strictly implemented. A solid, trustworthy peer review process is essential. However, it must be kept in mind that quality standards vary within and between disciplines and to some extent also over time. Quality standards can be time- and culture-sensitive. Moreover, the peer review process is not unproblematic.⁸ Some say it is ineffective, slow, expensive, inefficient, easily abused and prone to bias. Opening up the review

8 See, for example, http://www.theguardian.com/science/occams-corner/2015/sep/07/peer-review-preprints-speed-science-journals.

181 process, for example, by publishing reviews and by making raw data available for a possible reproduction of published research are therefore becoming more popular. Guaranteeing responsible scientists also requires life-long ethics sensitisation, which includes the handling and disclosure of financial sources. Proactive measures are needed to prevent misconduct and fraud, instead of focusing on defensive or re-active measures.

Another area where greater responsibility is required is the use of data. Trust is essential for profiting from the full potential of datafication without undermining further citizens' privacy.

Flyverbom recommends a focus on the development of 'sustainable data value chains', which would be a responsible and trust-enhancing process of turning data into valuable insights. As more business develops in this area, the need for responsible and sustainable models and arrangements is increasingly important. New Internet and big data industries still need support in developing sustainable value chains, for example, when drafting innovative privacy policies and mechanisms for data-handling that respect customer and regulatory concerns without limiting the potentials of datafication. Furthermore, there is a clear need for capacity-building and competence development as an important component of big data infrastructures to avoid 'big data literacies' and enable organisations to make use of the novel opportunities offered by datafication.

3.2. Increase transparency and participation for higher legitimacy of political action

Transparency contributes to enhancing and restoring trust between societal actors, i.e., citizens, governments and other public organisations (e.g., courts, the police, political parties), non-governmental bodies and private entities. Transparency involves the provision of complete information to individuals, for example, when access to data has been given to intelligence services or on the data and methodology used in scientific projects and publications to enable reproducibility. However, transparency could have a trust-eroding effect if it leads, for example, to the relentless disclosure of misbehaviour, fraud or corruption of governments, administrations or private actors. Therefore, Wright argues that transparency is not enough to rebuild trust, but must come along with the effective engagement of citizens and stakeholders through participatory and deliberative methods.

This is particularly relevant for science and research as a decline in trust can be the result of a lack of understanding of scientific praxis, and a limited openness of the science community. Scientists must be open and explicit about what they know and – even more important – what they do not know, about the uncertainties they have to deal with and about the knowledge gaps that exist.

Scientists should not assume they know what users want and need, but rather must work closely with civil society, industry, business and political leaders to create relationships built on trust, and devise solutions to big challenges. Policy-makers and scientists themselves must support ways of increasing public involvement in agenda-setting and the direction of research (citizens' science) and train researchers in risk communication to promote a trust-related future for science. The legitimacy of (and trust in) research results would also increase through more public funding of research areas of high sensitivity for consumers as financial dependence on industry is a factor for increasing mistrust in research endeavours.

Internet governance is an exemplary case where legitimate authority beyond the nation state is becoming more pertinent for improving a culture of trust. Internet governance encompasses a growing array of international policies and treaties such as free trade agreements, foreign and security policies, data protection or copyright reform with significant impact on digital communication. Integrating these policy issues would be a crucial step towards the constitutionalisation of the institutional framework of Internet governance, which would in turn be a necessary response to expressions of distrust and a confirmation to expectations of Internet governance legitimacy. This process will transform the institutional repertoire available to respond to crises of trust but not eliminate such crises per se.

The legitimacy of activities of public administrations would be positively influenced by the application of trust-based management and steering mechanisms. These mechanisms rely to a large extent on transparency and participation and include relational contacting (i.e., partners are committed to each other for the long term and the contracts are not very detailed; detailed performance metrics are missing), partnership working, but also new regulatory styles (e.g., relatively few formalised rules; self-regulation of citizens and companies). It has been observed that strict enforcement and coercion do not necessarily lead to better outcomes, and may increase transaction costs.

An important issue to consider is what these trust-based management and steering mechanisms mean for the behaviour of the actors involved, for example, for civil servants and citizens (including researchers). Changing levels of trust between public officials and researchers may have

182 important implications for the way in which research and innovation policies and funding programmes will operate. In a situation where research funding goes mainly to an 'in-group' of trusted research partners, exit behaviour is highly likely as the majority of scientists will have no incentive anymore to apply for funding.

A breakdown of trust in the justice system would have disastrous effects on society, including for science, research and innovation. Relying on the rule of law and a fair justice system is essential for the freedom of science and speech. The legitimacy of the institutions of justice is therefore core to keep a high-level of trust in the system, as Boda argues in this report. Improving institutional legitimacy is closely related to decriminalisation (e.g., over-criminalising minor offences should be avoided), policies that aim at a fairer justice system in procedural terms (treating people with dignity and fairness, increasing the accountability, integrity and legality of institutional operations, and giving the people a 'voice'), and at a more effective justice system (by, for example, reducing the duration of cases at courts). However, any policy must consider that different economic circumstances, the political culture, individual income situations or personal experiences have an influence on the level of trust in justice systems.

3.3. Consider regulation as a trust-enhancing tool

Some contributions in this report call for putting greater attention to rules and regulations as trust-enhancing tools. The rationale behind this is that where general trust in society decreases or collapses rules and regulations have to come in and bolster societal relations. Institutions, here rules and regulations, would substitute trust. Trust might be regained in systems where institutional action and the rule of law are predictable (rule-based trust; cf. Kramer 1999). Strict regulations could be seen as a precautionary measure 'to avoid negative trust-related futures' (Hermerén). Restrictive precautionary regulation may increase trust in innovators but may also hamper innovation and technological advancement as innovative activity requires risk taking (which precautionary regulation hardly allows). A high level of trust in companies (possibly triggered by precautionary regulation) correlates positively with citizens' willingness to accept innovation (see Pitlik). These interrelations create a classical policy dilemma: on the one hand, the stricter the regulation, the higher the trust in the innovator and the higher the citizen's acceptance, but the lower the innovativeness of an economy; on the other hand, the lighter the regulation, the lower the trust in the innovator and the lower the citizen's acceptance, but the higher the innovativeness of an economy. Smarter (or 'better') regulation, which recognises specific tests on how innovation impacts on the economy, the environment, and the society, could help overcome the dilemma situation resulting in increasing trust (through more transparency for citizens regarding the innovation impacts of regulations) and innovativeness (relaxing the precautionary principle in regulations).

Similar dilemmas exist in other areas. Flyverbom, in this report, argues that while legislation that fosters data localisation can provide greater security and privacy protection for citizens and companies as governments gain both physical control and legal jurisdiction over data being stored on local servers, these laws may also ease censorship and surveillance. Not to undermine the functioning of the Internet needs refined privacy regulation regimes that balance innovation, connectivity and the possible benefits of big data with concerns over anonymity and protection of sensitive, personal data. However, as such a framework does not exist yet, experiments with novel approaches and solutions must be researched and tested.

3.4. Studying the role of trust in society

This report provides a quite rich analysis of the role of trust in different areas of society, what a decrease of trust would mean, and how Europe should react to such developments. However, authors are also clear about knowledge gaps prohibiting a full understanding of the effects of declining trust on society, policies and institutions.

First, as values play a core role in trusting or being trusted, a better understanding of values, such as integrity, loyalty, interdependence, good will, and reliance, and their relations to each other is required. Generally, more attention of research funders should be devoted to trust and ethical issues, for example, in the context of surveillance, data aggregation, data fusion and the sale of personal data, and further to the meaning of surveillance for democracy.

Second, since increasing diversity is one of the main societal challenges in Europe there is a need to study this increasing diversity and its impact on various forms of trust.

Third, issues such as big data and algorithmic knowledge production should be central in future research. As more and more organisations – public and well as private – rely on big data for purposes of prediction and anticipation, one needs to know about the benefits and pitfalls of

183 algorithmic forms of knowledge production. The implications of making decisions about healthcare, risk management and crime prevention by relying on digital traces and algorithmic calculations on long-standing institutions, including the welfare state and democracy, are not well understood yet.

Fourth, we are not clear about whether constitutional frameworks for private authority on the transnational level have a similar trust-generating effect as they have on the national level.

However, such knowledge, as well as an analysis of the capacity, the strengths and weaknesses of multi-stakeholder processes, is important for designing effective global governance regimes.

Fifth, improved data collection on several aspects of trust should be a preference. Careful data collection, for example, about what effects the level of trust in political institutions and political representatives could be quite useful in improving our understanding of both how policies can (and cannot) be effectively implemented, and how and when citizens change their perceptions about the trust political institutions and political representatives deserve.

REFERENCES

Hardin, Russell (2002), Trust and Trustworthiness. New York: Russell Sage.

Kiss, Jemima (2014), Privacy tools used by 28% of the online world, research finds. Guardian, 21 January 2014 (http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/ jan/21/privacy-tools-censorship-online-anonymity-tools).

Kramer, Roderick M. (1999), 'Trust and distrust in organizations: Emerging perspectives, enduring questions', in: Annual Review of Psychology, 50, 569-598.

Mariën, Sofie/Hooghe, Marc (2011), 'Does political trust matter? an empirical investigation into the relation between political trust and support for law compliance', in: European Journal of Political Research, 50(2), 267-291.

McPherson, Miller/Smith-Lovin, Lynn/Cook, James M. (2001), 'Birds of a feather: homophily in social networks', in: Annual Review of Sociology, 27, 415-444.

Sztompka, Piotr (1998), 'Trust, Distrust and Two Paradoxes of Democracy', in: European Journal of Social Theory, 1(1), 19-32.

UN Scientific Advisory Board (2014), Towards a strengthened science-policy linkage, Background paper for the Inaugural Meeting of the SAB, Berlin, 30-31 January 2014.

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