Research Data

We collected our data by survey, for which we took a random sample of 2,000 citizens. We sent them our questionnaire in December 2000. After the first round, the response rate was only 24%. After the second round in January 2001, the response rate rose to 39% (N = 783). The result seems quite low, but it is in line with similar national surveys. The sample is, moreover, statistically sufficient for reliable results.

We described the basic functions of each ministry in our questionnaire because we supposed that respondents may not have a clear understanding of them. In addition, we also wrote a brief explanation about what ministries are and their positions in public organizations in our covering letter. We tried to direct them to assess their trust not in civil servants or in politicians acting as ministers, but in ministries as organizations as straightly as possible.

A few words about our sample will describe our respondents. There were 54% men and 46% women in our sample. From them 41% were over 50 years old, 40% were between 31 to 49 years old and 19% were between 18 to 30 years old. Nearly every other respondent (46%) had a university degree. One in five from our respondents supported right-wing parties, about every other supported center parties and one in three favored leftist parties. About third of respondents held themselves as middle class and as working class, the rest being entrepreneurs and pensioners. These figures show that our sample represents roughly the population in general.

This study is the first of its kind in Finland in its comprehensiveness. It is a part of the central administration's renewal project initiated by the Prime Minister's Office in 1998 with the purpose of inducing quality into services and administration and paving the way towards a responsible civil society. As a result, the Ministry of Finance ordered an expert evaluation of the central administration from Geert Bouckaert, Derry Ormond and Guy Peters, who published their results in 2000 (Bouckaert, Ormond & Peters, 2000). One of their recommendations to government was that the Ministry of Finance should find out to what extent citizens really consider the ministries to be trustworthy. Our study is the response to their recommendation.