[EAI Governance Studies 3] Pyeongtaek City's Government Trust from the Perspective of 'Quality of Life'

EAI Governance Studies Working Paper No. 3

Author

Lee Gon-soo (李坤洙) is a Senior Research Fellow at the Governance Research Team of the East Asia Institute.

I. Introduction

Government trust is a major driving force for government and an indispensable element for good governance. In a complex policy environment, securing public support must precede the successful implementation of government policies. This is because it is more difficult to secure the legitimacy and ensure the efficient operation of new policies than to design them. The loss or decline of government trust can increase the cost of cooperation between the government and citizens, create obstacles in the policy process, and consequently lead to poor policy outcomes or government failure. It may even be impossible to expect policy success without building trust between the public and the government. Furthermore, the importance of government trust can be emphasized in that poor government performance or government failure can further increase public distrust in the government, thereby forming a vicious cycle of government failure.

The issue of declining government trust is a significant concern not only for central governments but also for local governments. Although it has been 20 years since local autonomy was fully implemented, local governments are facing a severe 'crisis of trust.' The arbitrary exercise of power by mayors, corruption and bribery, inefficient financial management, and increasing risks of bankruptcy are prevalent. Moreover, the incompetence and corruption of local councils, which have been problematic from the outset, remain unaddressed, making them a serious target of distrust. This decline in trust in local governments is leading to skepticism and arguments against the necessity of local autonomy itself.

This reality indicates the need to systematically and rigorously address the issue of government trust not only at the central government level but also at the local government level. However, research on government trust has predominantly focused on central governments or the national level, with very little research on trust at the local government level. Even when the issue of trust in local governments is discussed, it is often treated as a part of social capital or local governance. Recognizing this problem, the present study aims to thoroughly examine the issue of trust in local governments.

To this end, this study focuses on the sources of government trust, starting from the proposition, verified in numerous prior studies, that 'government trust is a function of government performance.' However, the challenge lies in the difficulty of measuring government performance as a source of trust for local governments, unlike for central governments. According to studies on government trust, economic performance and diplomatic performance are primarily emphasized as the basis for trust and support for central governments. However, at the local government level, it is difficult to distinguish performance comparable to that of central governments, and it is also challenging to measure residents' perceptions and evaluations of such performance. In particular, in the case of economic performance, it is difficult to accurately distinguish between regional economic performance and national economic performance, and responsibility for regional economic performance is dispersed between the central and local governments. Furthermore, considering the comprehensive administrative service provision characteristic of local governments, their performance needs to be approached from a holistic perspective rather than evaluating specific policies. While evaluations of individual policies or administrative services may be meaningful to specific customer groups or interest groups, they may diverge from residents' overall assessment of the local government. Therefore, it is appropriate to utilize comprehensive performance indicators at the regional level rather than focusing on the performance of specific policy areas.

In this regard, the 'quality of life' in a region can serve as a useful indicator of local government 'performance.' The ultimate goal of local government is to improve the quality of life for its residents, and it is the result of policies and administration aimed at changing the regional quality of life conditions in a desirable direction. Therefore, this study empirically examines the relationship between local government policy performance and government trust from the perspective of 'quality of life,' using Pyeongtaek City as a case study. In other words, it analyzes how Pyeongtaek citizens' evaluative perceptions of the regional quality of life conditions influence their trust in the city government and discusses the implications.

II. Theoretical Background

1. Quality of Life and Local Government

The term 'Quality of Life' (QOL) is widely used in everyday language, but there is no clear conceptual consensus among scholars. This is because the concept of QOL itself is ambiguous and raises various questions regarding its conceptualization, and more importantly, many QOL studies have been conducted for practical purposes without rigorous conceptual definitions (Song Geon-seop & Kwon Yong-hyun 2008, 87-88). Above all, QOL is not an absolute concept transcending time and space but rather a relative concept influenced by the political, economic, and social levels of a society and the values and interests of its members, leading to diverse conceptual definitions among scholars (Lee Young-gyun & Kim Dong-gyun 2007, 225). In regional studies, QOL is often understood as residents' subjective satisfaction and happiness with their place of residence, or as 'livability' (Park Cheol-min & Song Geon-seop 1999; Meyers 1987), and is understood to be determined by the combination of situational conditions offered by a specific region and the needs and expectations of the individuals perceiving them (Pavot and Diener 1993).

Here, the importance of government responsibility and role in the conditions of quality of life is emphasized. Local governments, in particular, being at the forefront of administration, bear direct responsibility for the quality of life of their residents and have a duty to strive for its improvement. Accordingly, each local government pursues the enhancement of regional competitiveness and the improvement of residents' quality of life through various regional development projects tailored to local conditions. This requires not only 'economic capacity' but also institutional capacity to resolve various issues, such as ensuring a suitable living environment and natural environment that can guarantee quality of life. In this context, this study understands 'quality of life' within the framework of regional development as 'the subjective cognitive evaluation by residents living under the social, economic, cultural, and environmental living conditions of a specific region' (Lee Young-gyun & Kim Dong-gyun 2007, 226). Such an evaluation of regional quality of life conditions can serve as useful information for ensuring local government accountability and formulating policies for regional development.

Then, how can the 'quality of life' of a region be measured? Why is residents' evaluation of the regional 'quality of life' conditions important? Measurement methods for quality of life are typically divided into objective and subjective approaches. The objective approach defines quality of life as objective living conditions that affect a person's satisfactory life (Ha Hye-soo 1996; Slottje et al. 1991). This is based on the premise of causality, where objective physical living conditions influence subjective satisfaction. Therefore, it is based on socio-environmental indicators that can be objectively measured. In contrast, the subjective approach is based on how well life meets an individual's value standards or expectations (Song Geon-seop & Kwon Yong-hyun 2008; Andrews and Withey 1976; Meyers 1987).

Since judgments about quality of life can be contradictory, it is difficult to say which criterion is more appropriate. In this regard, an integrated approach that combines the objective and subjective methods, integrating both quantitatively measured objective living conditions and subjectively perceived well-being, is sometimes emphasized (So Jin-kwang 1998). However, many scholars emphasize the subjective aspect of quality of life over objective conditions such as living environment (Seong Do-kyung & Lee Ji-young 2010, 755). In particular, a subjective approach to a specific region has high applicability due to fewer constraints in indicator development and data acquisition, and can be specified according to the characteristics of the surveyed region. This makes it highly valuable as policy information for the respective local government. Furthermore, it has the advantage of conforming to the normative demand that regional development policies in the era of local autonomy should be based on the needs of local residents (Oh Young-seok & Lee Gon-soo 2006).

The purpose of this study is not to measure the level of 'quality of life' itself, but to verify the relationship between the quality of life conditions in the Pyeongtaek region and the trust of local residents in the city government. Therefore, the focus of the analysis is on Pyeongtaek residents' cognitive evaluation of the regional quality of life conditions, as changed through Pyeongtaek City's policy efforts. For this, the construction of subjective evaluation indicators for quality of life is important. Many prior studies have presented various forms of evaluation indicators according to their research objectives. Kim Tae-ryong et al. (2000) divided the level and determinants of quality of life at the local government level into 10 areas: food, clothing, and shelter; values; social relationships and education; safety, health, and welfare; economy; leisure; administration and participation; social infrastructure; and environment. Similarly, Choi Jun-ho et al. (2003) divided it into 10 areas: public safety management, disaster management, transportation, residential life, environmental management, natural environment, education, welfare, culture, and resident participation. In contrast, Song In-seong (2004) presents 10 areas including population, income and employment, housing, education, health, traffic safety, resident participation, natural environment, leisure activities, artificial environment, and land market. Song Geon-seop (2007) organized them into healthy living conditions, public safety living conditions, convenient living conditions, natural environment conditions, educational conditions, leisure activities and cultural life, economic living conditions, and other living conditions. Meanwhile, the Morrison Institution (2004) divided them into education, public safety and crime, economy, environment, family and youth, transportation and mobility, community, arts, culture, and leisure, and Santos et al. (2007) presented 13 variables as subjective quality of life indicators, including environment, urbanization, mobility, culture, sports and recreation, education, health, social welfare, trade services, residential life, urban safety, poverty and exclusion, and social activities. As can be seen, subjective studies also construct quality of life measurement variables differently depending on the emphasis. In this study, by reviewing these prior studies related to quality of life, variables were constructed to measure regional quality of life conditions as proxy indicators of local government policy performance...