Democracy Thrives on Trust

"It's not just that people think differently, but that they no longer know what others are thinking." According to Eliana La Ferrara, this observation underlies one of the most profound transformations in American society. In a fragmented information ecosystem where everyone lives immersed in their own bubble, it is not only consensus on what counts as fact that disappears, but also the the common ground of shared expectations that allows citizens to trust each other, coordinate and recognize each other as part of the same community. More than just an electoral event, the November midterm vote therefore represents a test of the stability of US democracy in a country marked by political polarization, growing inequality, culture wars and a crisis of trust in institutions. It is a reality that continues to influence the rest of the world and, for this very reason, deserves to be observed well beyond the immediate outcome of the polls. Development economist and Professor of Public Policy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government of Harvard University, Eliana La Ferrara is an Alumna of Bocconi University, where she also held the Invernizzi Chair in Development Economics and founded the Laboratory for Effective Anti-poverty Policies (LEAP). Now part of the INSPIRE center, it is dedicated to the design and rigorous evaluation of effective anti-poverty policies, one of Europe's leading research centers in the field.

In this interview, La Ferrara interprets the fractures in America through the lens of her research. The result is an analysis that goes beyond US politics and concerns all Western democracies: because the real risk, she explains, is not just a more divided society, but a society that loses the ability to build trust, cooperation and a shared vision of the future.

You live and teach in the United States during a period of strong political and social polarization. What is the most profound change you have observed in American society in recent years?

There's much talk about the intensification of "partisan identity" as the lens through which Americans interpret reality, and this is certainly one of the things I've observed since moving to Boston four years ago. What has struck (and concerned) me most over the past two years, however, is the growing willingness to accept forms of behavior that violate shared norms: norms of mutual respect, norms of solidarity. It is as if there were a sense of individual powerlessness in the face of certain events — which is almost paradoxical in a culture built on the idea that every individual is the architect of their own destiny.

In your work on trust and civic participation, you've shown how social cohesion is an essential component of well-functioning communities. Do you feel that in the United States the bonds of trust that allow a democracy to recognize itself as a collective project are weakening today?

Data from the General Social Survey document a significant decline in interpersonal trust in the United States from the 1970s to the present, especially with regard to generalized trust, i.e. that "bridging capital" that unites different people. Recent research on perceptions of inequality also shows how Americans have become increasingly pessimistic about the existence of shared opportunities. There is a growing perception that the economy is a zero-sum competition, and this reduces the possibility of sustaining mechanisms of cooperation.

Are the divisions that exist today in the United States primarily economic or cultural? Or do these two dimensions reinforce each other?

The distinction has become increasingly less useful, because the two dimensions feed each other. The economic decline of many communities has translated into social disintegration and fueled resentment that has given rise to identarian narratives. These narratives, in turn, make more difficult the building of political coalitions geared towards redistribution, fueling a vicious circle. Those with an interest in blocking redistributive policies can benefit from stoking cultural divisions.

Do you get the impression that in the United States the main boundary lines between groups are no longer ethnic or religious, but rather political?

In the American context, political identity and religious identity are merging, especially on the conservative right. "Christian nationalism" is the most recent instance of this, where Christian identity (predominantly white and evangelical) and political affiliation tend to coincide. This is dangerous for democracy because it brings into play an "emotional mobilization" that makes dialogue on the facts and evidence underpinning various policy alternatives increasingly difficult.

How much does information fragmentation contribute to making it more difficult to build trust and social cohesion today?

Mass media have never been neutral in shaping social preferences and identities. With social media, the problem has worsened: "echo chambers" have been created that expose users almost exclusively to content reinforcing their own beliefs. But there's a further dimension, which I find fascinating. The media influences not only what individuals think, their so-called "first-order beliefs." They also influence their "second-order beliefs," i.e. what each individual thinks others are thinking. For instance, when I watch a widely followed program, I know that others are watching it too, and I can therefore anticipate the orientation of their opinions. This shared awareness allows people to coordinate and act together, trusting that others are reasoning from similar premises. In a fragmented information ecosystem, this mechanism fails: it's not just that people think differently, but that they no longer know what others are thinking. And without this common ground, building trust and undertaking collective projects becomes more difficult.

Are the tensions currently affecting US campuses a phenomenon internal to the academic world, or do they reflect deeper societal transformations?

Universities are places where tensions traditionally emerge in a concentrated form for several reasons: they put in contact young people from very diverse backgrounds in the same space, often their first time of experiencing diversity, and they are venues where ideas are explicitly tested and debate is encouraged. The tensions we observe today in universities over freedom of expression, the relationship with national history and representation reflect the same fractures that exist in wider society. To regard them as a self-referential phenomenon of the academic world would be an error of perspective.

Many of the fissures we observe in America seem to be emerging, in different ways, in Europe as well. Which ones should we observe more closely because they could predict our future?

I suggest we should carefully observe three dynamics. The first is the speed at which "partisan identity" can replace other forms of belonging, rendering acceptable norms and behaviors that in the past would have been sanctioned. The second is the loss of a shared informational reality and a reduction in the weight of scientific evidence and established facts in shaping prevailing narratives. The third, perhaps more unexpected, is the psychological dynamic affecting younger generations. We are witnessing a backlash against inclusion policies and a return to more conservative positions, especially among young men. This may be a sign of a generation that feels excluded from the promise of progress.

If you had to identify a priority for rebuilding trust and cooperation in contemporary democracies, where would you start?

I would start with two interconnected conditions. The first is investment in intermediary institutions: schools, public spaces, local associations. The literature on the "contact hypothesis" shows that trust is built through real and repeated interactions, in which people meet as individuals and not as representatives of a category. This is profoundly different from virtual exposure: on social media, everyone projects an image of themselves that tends to reinforce stereotypes, one that neither gives nor asks anything of others. Lived contact, with its difficulties and the opportunity to learn who the others are, is for me a crucial tool for rebuilding trust. The second condition concerns collective expectations about what is right to do. Democratic norms are not just formal rules: they are social balances that hold as long as people believe that other people are respecting them too. This is why public language matters: every time a leader normalizes contempt for institutions, they erode everybody's expectations. Rebuilding trust also means reaffirming that it is still a shared norm to take into consideration the needs of different groups and respect the rules of the democratic game.