Trust of Private Businesses in State Regulatory Enforcement Authorities

Abstract

Trust to public institutes is an important driver of public policy effectiveness in various areas. In literature it is common to analyze trust in government or certain public institutions by total population. However, such indicator may not reflect the specifics of certain groups. This article based on sociological survey conducted in 2021 evaluates the trust in state regulatory control bodies by representatives of private businesses. It is demonstrated that the trust in state regulatory enforcement authorities on the part of businesses who had experience in interacting with such bodies is higher compared to the one measured for total population. The gap is explained by the fact that business trust is influenced by perceptions of personal experience in dealing with state regulatory enforcement bodies, performance and integrity of these authorities. Noteworthy, business trust in state regulatory enforcement bodies is also correlated with perceptions of quality of regulations which are the subject for inspections by the authorities in question.