Unveiling Political (Dis)trust Building across Different Life Stages: A Focus Group Analysis on Trust and Distrust to COVID-Related Restrictions in Italy

Abstract

Why did citizens trust (or not trust) political actors making binding decisions? How did levels of trust vary with age, and why? This article addresses these questions by examining the management of the COVID-19 pandemic in Italy as a natural experiment. Drawing on focus groups from different age cohorts and conducting a qualitative thematic analysis, we aim to determine whether and how citizens’ appraisals—and, crucially, their justifications—vary across age groups, with particular focus on youth perspectives. Our findings suggest that younger citizens based their assessments on the perceived governmental “responsibility,” whereas older citizens evaluated it on the basis of the government’s perceived “rationality.”