ISSN 1847-2397 godište II broj 1 2009. | volume II number 1 2009

Plamena Pehlivanova: The Decline of Trust in Post-Communist Societiessuvremene TEME, (2009.) God. 2, Br. 1CONTEMPORARY issues, (2009) Vol. 2, No. 1an example of civic participation, which providesfor bonding and establishment of social trust. Hefurther argues that social trust is strongly associatedwith forms of civic engagement and socialcapital. Putnam implies that “people, who trusttheir fellow citizens, volunteer more often, participatemore often in politics and communityorganisations.” (Putnam, 2000: 136-137). It isdiscouraging to see the statistic on Bulgaria andRussia, which show a decline in participationand relevantly the decline in trust. In her articleSocialization for Participation, Natalia Letki discussesthat the low level of citizen involvementin politics, in East-Central Europe, is linked tolow levels of social capital. Letki mentions theprevailing apathy, lack of interest and low participationin politics. (Letki, 2004: 669). Accordingly,the author cites leading sociologists suchas Inglehart and Catterberg, who argue that theweakness of political involvement are blamed onthe weakness of civil society and low levels ofinterpersonal trust.The World Value Survey and the NewDemocracies Barometer present very little positivetrust in civil and political institutions (for Bulgaria)with most distrust directed toward the JudiciarySystem and the Parliament. Participationin political parties, trade unions and other governmentorganisations is witnessing a decline.From Putnam’s point of view, Bulgaria and Russiaare witnessing a great decline in participationin relation to trust. However, one might arguethat this evaluation is based only on the analysisof formal civic and political organisations.As argued by Clark, Achterberg andNavarro, Putnam doesn’t take an account forscenes 3 and thus excludes the unofficial types ofsocial participation, which also generate social3 Scenes are the concept introduced in Clark, Achterberg,and Navarro conference paper Culture is on the Rise - Why?Theories of Cultural Participation and Empirical Evidence.Scenes are constructed by physical structures, people andneighborhoods. People’s interaction with these structurescreates the dynamic of scenes. The three aspects of scenes(values on which they are judged) are: legitimacy, authenticityand theatricality.Table 3Rising Membership of Cultural Activity GroupsCountry 1981 1990 2000 DeltaNetherlands 12,5 34,6 45,2 32,7USA 13,9 19,7 36,9 23Bulgaria 4,3 4 -0,3Portugal 6,2 3,7 -2,5Brazil 5,4 2,4 -3Latvia 6,8 3,7 -3,1Russia 4,9 1,2 -3,7Lithuania 7,3 2,9 -4,4China 7,3 2,2 -5,1* Survey conducted by Terry Clark, University of Chicagocentar za politološka istraživanjathe political science research centrewww.cpi.hr37