The Dynamics of Political Trust among Youth

Democracies function more effectively when citizens support key institutions. This necessitates the need to examine young people‘s level of trust towards a number of political/public institutions of the state. A representative sample was drawn to make inferences about the entire youth population according to Systematic Random Sampling Method. As performance seems an inherent element of political trust, youth were asked to rate the performance of the present government and as well as the performance of their MLA. People with a more favourable evaluation of the performance of their government will be more likely to show a higher level of political trust. The study reveals that many youth are not satisfied with the performance of the present government. They have given a number of reasons which may have increased political cynicism and discontent among young people leading to low level of trust especially in political institutions and authorities.