The project studies recent attempts to promote trust-based governance in Danish and Norwegian municipalities.

In the public debate, the term “trust reforms” is used to describe attempts to replace excessive control routines in public organizations with trust-based approaches that emphasize professional autonomy, flexibility and co-determination. The project aims to develop a coherent understanding of how control and trust-based management within public services can have an impact on trust in the cooperation between different actors in the welfare apparatus, and also on citizens’ trust in welfare services. For example, is it the case that more flexibility and freedom to make professional judgments can lead to better user experiences, and thus improve trust in welfare services? Or are perhaps comprehensive control mechanisms and performance measurements a prerequisite for citizens’ trust in services, as supporters of the “New Public Governance” reform movement have claimed?

To find an answer to this, we must, among other things:

• Interview key national actors, including trade unions and political parties, who have been drivers of trust reforms in the public debate.

• Mapping trust reforms in Norwegian municipalities.

• Conduct surveys of municipal directors about how trust is worked on in Danish and Norwegian municipalities.

• Have case studies in a selection of Norwegian and Danish municipalities that are working on concrete trust reforms.

• Conduct ethnographic studies that look more closely at the connections between political culture, governance, and trust in local communities.

Preliminary findings from the project show a great deal of variation, both in the understanding of what trust reforms are and how Norwegian municipalities work with trust. While many can point to positive experiences, there are also many in Norwegian municipalities who find it difficult to translate the ambition to work more trust-based into concrete action. In the planned publications from the project, we will, among other things, look at:

• The understanding of the problems and the understanding of trust that underlies the trust reforms.

• Institutional prerequisites for trust-based governance.

• Consequences and challenges for political control and governance.

• The importance of trust in solving municipal challenges.

• The concept of trust in the translation from abstract concept to concrete practices.

• Dilemmas in implementing trust reforms.

• The connections between social organization and trust.

• How vertical control and trust affect cooperation between services.