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.

圖為美國《華盛頓郵報》報道截圖。

據報道，在2020年4月下旬，中國武漢市解封“重啟”後不久，吳教授進行了一次大規模在線調查。其團隊與17名中國學者合作，從全國53所大學招募了600名學生，由此開展1對1的網上採訪，確保樣本來自各個地區，同時調查保證受訪者保持匿名。最終，來自31個省級行政區的19816名中國公民接受了訪問。

值得注意的是，根據2018年的世界價值觀調查(World Values Survey)顯示，95%的中國民眾表示，他們非常對中央政府相當信任。

而吳教授團隊此次的調研數據顯示，中國公民對中央政府的信任度提高到98%。與2018年相比，中國民眾對當地政府的信任程度有所提升——91%的人表示，他們信任或完全信任當地的鄉鎮級別政府。縣級政府信任度提升至93%，市政府達94%，省政府達95%。

報道稱，“這些數字表明，中國民眾已經越來越信任各級政府。”

吳教授團隊的調查還詢問受訪者，自從疫情暴發以後，他們對於政府的信任度有何變化。近半數(49%)受訪者表示，自疫情以來，對中央政府更加信任；48%的受訪者表示信任度在疫情前後不變。

而民眾對政府如此信任，意味着什麼？

吳教授團隊的調查數據顯示，疫情期間，1%的中國公民對中國政府持消極憤世的態度；55%的民眾持彌散性信任，44%持特定信任。

報道指出，這些調查結果不能簡單地歸結為“出於政治恐懼的虛假陳述”。其發現也與其他調查學者反覆顯示的結果一致。調查研究還顯示，“中國民眾確實毫無畏懼地表達了他們對政府的真實態度。”