“Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities”. A comparative study on the effect of secularity in European countries on Political trust among Christians

Where before politics in European countries were dominated by Christianity, with the rise of other religions and people losing their faith, Christianity is no longer that important in society and the political arena. In the high days of Christianity, political trust was natural. Members of the Christian community were politicians and took decisions in their best interests. Christians were seen as prosocial, since they were socialised into norms of trust. Nowadays, it is harder for Christians to have political trust. Their political representation has declined and liberal norms and values that form a threat to the Christian way of life became more important. In this thesis an attempt has been made to answer the question of to what extent Christians have higher levels of political trust than seculars, and if these levels of political trust are lower in the most secular countries. This is relevant, since political trust is important for policies to have the desired outcomes. A multilevel model is applied, using the available countries and waves of the European Social Survey. Data on the individual and country level is analyzed. The results indicate that Christians do indeed have higher levels of political trust than seculars. Societal secularity, though, does not influence this relationship negatively. Several explanations can be given for these unexpected results. Such as the possibility that because of the secular context they live in, believes weaken and Christians start to show similar behavior to seculars.