https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/05/05/did-pandemic-shake-chinese-citizens-trust-their-government/?fbclid=IwAR3-ZAzp8oUJcOyiCqTMmlX1rqmcrf2Yy8C9S508cPUo_u91-P-LtzS1sqg

I conducted a large-scale online survey in the immediate aftermath of the reopening of Wuhan in late April 2020. The survey differed from many other surveys that are simply posted through online platforms that yield no details on who has access and who has responded. I designed an innovative approach that captures aspects of face-to-face survey approaches.

In collaboration with 17 Chinese academics, we recruited more than 600 students from 53 universities across China to conduct one-on-one interviews online. This helped ensure that the survey was widely distributed across all regions. We assigned each team leader a unique access code for his or her survey link, so we could protect and monitor each survey. Respondents were assured that their responses would be anonymous.

In the end, we interviewed 19,816 individuals from 31 provinces or provincial-level administrative regions across China. The resulting sample was roughly comparable to the census in terms of age and urban-to-rural ratio, but it did have higher participation rates of female and more educated respondents.

The data show that Chinese citizens’ trust in their national government increased to 98 percent. Their trust in local government also increased compared to 2018 levels — 91 percent of Chinese citizens surveyed now said they trust or trust completely the township-level government. Trust levels rose to 93 percent at the county level, 94 percent at the city level and 95 percent at the provincial level. These numbers suggest that Chinese citizens have become more trusting in all levels of government.

图为美国《华盛顿邮报》报道截图。

据报道，在2020年4月下旬，中国武汉市解封“重启”后不久，吴教授进行了一次大规模在线调查。其团队与17名中国学者合作，从全国53所大学招募了600名学生，由此开展1对1的网上采访，确保样本来自各个地区，同时调查保证受访者保持匿名。最终，来自31个省级行政区的19816名中国公民接受了访问。

值得注意的是，根据2018年的世界价值观调查(World Values Survey)显示，95%的中国民众表示，他们非常对中央政府相当信任。

而吴教授团队此次的调研数据显示，中国公民对中央政府的信任度提高到98%。与2018年相比，中国民众对当地政府的信任程度有所提升——91%的人表示，他们信任或完全信任当地的乡镇级别政府。县级政府信任度提升至93%，市政府达94%，省政府达95%。

报道称，“这些数字表明，中国民众已经越来越信任各级政府。”

吴教授团队的调查还询问受访者，自从疫情暴发以后，他们对于政府的信任度有何变化。近半数(49%)受访者表示，自疫情以来，对中央政府更加信任；48%的受访者表示信任度在疫情前后不变。

而民众对政府如此信任，意味着什么？

吴教授团队的调查数据显示，疫情期间，1%的中国公民对中国政府持消极愤世的态度；55%的民众持弥散性信任，44%持特定信任。

报道指出，这些调查结果不能简单地归结为“出于政治恐惧的虚假陈述”。其发现也与其他调查学者反复显示的结果一致。调查研究还显示，“中国民众确实毫无畏惧地表达了他们对政府的真实态度。”