J. A, Robinson ; L. A, Winters ; R, Sandow ; S, Young ; C, Hogan (2024) ‘We’re saying that we trust them but really we don’t’: The discursive framing of TRUST in international trade deals’ Centre for Inclusive Trade Policy, Working Paper 016
" } ["group_head_shared"]=> array(2) { ["meta_description"]=> string(0) "" ["toggle_markup"]=> array(0) { } } ["group_sitemap"]=> array(3) { ["sitemap_hide"]=> bool(false) ["change_frequency"]=> string(7) "monthly" ["priority"]=> string(3) "0.5" } ["group_search"]=> array(2) { ["search_hide"]=> bool(false) ["search_term"]=> string(0) "" } ["group_preload"]=> array(2) { ["prefetch_post"]=> string(0) "" ["preload_image"]=> bool(false) } ["layouts"]=> array(2) { [0]=> array(2) { ["acf_fc_layout"]=> string(11) "layout_text" ["clone"]=> array(11) { [""]=> NULL ["group_bespoke"]=> array(3) { ["style"]=> string(7) "default" ["column_num"]=> string(1) "1" ["width_2_column"]=> string(8) "split-50" } ["group_column_1"]=> array(2) { ["text"]=> string(1335) "One key consequence of the UK leaving the EU (Brexit) is that it now has full responsibility for making its own international trade policy. In this context, NatCen and the Centre for Inclusive Trade Policy initiated Citizens’ Juries on the topic of trade policy. From the transcripts of these juries, we created a corpus of 317,974 words. Using corpus-assisted discourse analysis, we focus on the concept of trust in trade policy. We find that trust conferred on actors in trade policy is limited. The greatest degree of trust is conferred to experts, on account of their epistemically-elevated position. The government is broadly not trusted. Jurors wished to be consulted about trade policy decisions and be assured that they are based on sound advice, but few wished to have a role in actually making them. Our findings highlight a deficit of trust that could be remedied by greater honesty and transparency from the government.
Keywords: concept of trust, trade policy, Citizens’ Juries, corpus linguistics
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There were juries in Belfast, Bridgend, Doncaster, Paisley and Reading, each comprising about 20 people broadly representative of their locality. Each jury met five times – four online sessions of 2.5 hours and once all-day in person. Jurors worked on four trade-policy scenarios plus introductory and final sessions which posed broader questions. Most deliberations took place in groups of about six with a facilitator and those from the in-person meeting were audio-recorded and transcribed. These transcripts, comprising 317,974 words, provide the raw material for this paper.
In this paper, we apply corpus-assisted discourse analysis to focus on the concept of trust in trade policy. The issue arose not only when jurors were asked ‘whom do you trust to take decisions and whom do you trust to inform decisions’ but throughout their discussions. We approach the concept of trust via the notion of stance, distinguishing two types of stance. Affective stance refers to the orientation towards the topic of discourse, while epistemic stance refers to an individual’s certainty in the content of their proposition. Specifically, we consider how the use of particular words or expressions provides insight into attitudes towards trust in the context of trade deals, illustrating our results with many quotations.
The most frequent collocation (joint occurrence) for ‘trust’ is ‘not’ and the most frequent object of ‘not trust’ is government/politicians. Despite this, however, a number of jurors said that they reluctantly trusted the government: they had resigned themselves to trust the government in the perceived absence of an alternative. It is not always clear whether political actors were viewed as untrustworthy in principle or whether this applied just to specific political actors of the day. Given the UK’s political turmoil over the seven months preceding the juries in January/February 2023, the latter is likely true in part.
The dominant recipients of jurors’ trust were experts. These included not only ‘researchers’, ‘universities’, ‘scientists’ and technical experts (e.g. medics, lawyers), but also specialists in relevant trades (e.g. farmers for agricultural questions). The critical characteristics of experts were independence and neutrality (absence of personal interests), which some jurors also attributed to international organisations. The ‘need’ for experts was frequently heard, as was the wish that the government would consult them more frequently and more fully in policymaking.
Do jurors trust themselves, i.e. ‘the public’, with decisions? Almost always ‘no’, on the basis of a lack of knowledge about the complexities of international trade, and sometimes using terms such as ‘idiots’ and ‘stupid’. But they wanted the public to be consulted – and with decent information – partly to express their wishes but also because they felt that the public can bring unique insights to questions. The distinction between those who should decide (government etc.) and those who should inform was very clearly made by the juries.
In summary, many jurors did, begrudgingly, want ultimate accountability for trade deals to rest with the government and so believe that the government should make final decisions on them. But jurors also believed widely that the public should be informed, and in some cases consulted, about trade-policy issues. Likewise, there was a strong appetite for experts to inform decisions but, except in clearly technical cases such as food safety, much less for them to decide policy.
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