Bias perceptions and trust in public service institutions

The legitimacy of public service institutions hinges on their impartial nature. However, actors such as judges, scientists and police officers have been accused of either left- or right-wing bias around the world. This study examines the relationship between public perceptions of ideological bias among different types of public service professionals and levels of trust in their respective institutions. To this end, we collected original survey data in five European countries (Germany, the United Kingdom, Spain, Poland, and the Netherlands) measuring citizen perceptions of ideological bias (left or right) among the actors of six public service institutions: scientists, teachers, journalists, judges, police officers and civil servants. We find that bias perceptions are widespread and are linked to lower levels of trust in institutions in two distinct ways. In a stacked cross-institutional analysis with respondent fixed effects, higher perceived absolute bias and greater perceived ideological distance both correspond to lower levels of trust, with the latter pattern appearing more robust across countries and institutions. We conclude that while citizen attentiveness to actual biases can function as a healthy corrective, bias perceptions may also reflect an undesirable politicisation of institutions, with detrimental effects for the legitimacy of liberal democracy and its institutions.