In Media We Trust. Journalists and institutional trust perceptions in post-authoritarian and post-totalitarian countries

Abstract

Trust is a societal value that is difficult to gain and easy to lose. This article deals with the levels of trust that journalists working in eight post-authoritarian and post-totalitarian countries (Argentina, Bangladesh, Brazil, Czech Republic, Indonesia, Latvia, South Africa and Tanzania) have in various social institutions using data from the present Worlds of Journalism Study. In each country, results showed the level of trust in journalists’ own institution—the media—is higher than the level of trust in both political and regulative institutions. The expression of low trust, particularly in regulative institutions, in the sampled countries represents significantly different results from previous studies about journalists’ trust in countries with longer democratic traditions.