Securitized trust: on the multiple guises of the UK policy agenda during the Covid-19 pandemic

Wuerth, Milena, Storer, Liz, Simpson, Nikita ORCID: 0000-0001-5260-3266, Sarafian, Iliana ORCID: 0009-0001-1110-8194 and Duale, Suad (2024) Securitized trust: on the multiple guises of the UK policy agenda during the Covid-19 pandemic. Critical Policy Studies. ISSN 1946-0171

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Abstract

Against the backdrop of the uncertainty that characterized the COVID-19 pandemic, trust emerged as a key term employed by public officials and policymakers in the UK to represent the existence or dissolution of state–society relationships. Despite its ubiquity, trust remained ambiguous in its precise meaning and multiple in its usage. Through an analysis of key policy documents published since the onset of the pandemic, we look beyond the definition of trust to explore its various roles in the UK policymaking at the national level. Drawing on the work of Vivien Schmidt (2008, 2010), we bring attention to the relationship between the cognitive (or instrumental) and normative (or valued-based) functions of trust in contradicting domains of community and security. We argue that the multiplicity of trust in policy discourse creates a false unity across conflictual domains of the government agenda, obfuscating the workings of an increasingly austere state. ‘Securitized trust’, we propose, is produced when the language of trust is mobilized through policies that work to enforce compliance with government agendas, to monitor organizing at the community level, to manage personal data, and to enhance policing.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	© 2024 The Author(s)
Divisions:	Anthropology
Subjects:	R Medicine > RA Public aspects of medicine J Political Science > JF Political institutions (General) H Social Sciences > HV Social pathology. Social and public welfare. Criminology
Date Deposited:	03 Dec 2024 14:39
Last Modified:	19 Dec 2024 01:00
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/126231

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