Featured October 25, 2023 Building trust in government through strategic communications Back to Blog It doesn’t have to be all bad news. The public is eager to hear positive stories about the federal government Date October 30, 2023 | Updated on January 4, 2024 Authors Paul Hitlin Tags Recognition Earlier this month, the Partnership for Public Service honored exceptional public servants at the Samuel J. Heyman Service to America Medals®. The awards shine a spotlight on the remarkable accomplishments of federal employees and their work to benefit the nation. While the public often overlooks these accomplishments, our recent online survey showed that 75% of the American public is very interested in hearing more positive stories about the government and its employees while only 18% is not. This finding suggests the public has an appetite for learning more about our government’s positive impact. “Three-quarters of respondents said they are interested in hearing more positive stories about the federal government.“ Mostly negative coverage Respondents described hearing media coverage about government that is far more negative than positive. Fully 87% said they hear negative stories about the federal government and its impact while only 10% said they rarely or never hear such stories. By contrast, only about one-quarter, or 28%, said they hear positive stories compared with 69% who said they rarely or never do. All told, more than three times as many people said they hear negative stories than positive stories. These results come from an online survey of 1,000 U.S. adults conducted by the Partnership from Sept. 6-12, 2023, using an online panel provided by Pollfish and Prodege. While the survey is not a random, nationally representative sample of people’s views, we used sampling techniques to resemble the demographic makeup of the U.S. and approximate public opinion in the country. The need for more balance and trust While the news media plays an important role as a watchdog on the government and public officials—especially regarding corruption and impropriety—these results indicate the public is eager to hear different stories. The federal workforce consists of millions of people focused on solving problems facing the country, and while their efforts may be imperfect and the results mixed, the public wants to know more about things that are working. The balance of news coverage—or at least the perception of that balance—is a likely contributor to the low levels of trust in the federal government. When there is such a strong focus on things going wrong with the government, and less focus on the issues it is trying to solve, it helps strengthen an image of the government that is ineffective. If journalists want to respond to the interests of their audiences, they should consider putting more emphasis on the areas where government is helping to solve problems. Highlighting the positive impact of exceptional public employees is one way to share more good news. Visit ourpublicservice.org to learn more about our work to rebuild trust in government. *Featured image: Laura Cooper receives the 2023 Service to America Medal® for Federal Employee of the Year from Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks. Photo credit: Allison Shelley. Paul Hitlin manages research for the Partnership's Center for Presidential Transition and also helps lead the Partnership's research on public trust of the federal government. Leave a ReplyYou must be logged in to post a comment.
