Culture of mistrust: Political cynicism in the USA

While the United States are currently going through an unequaled economic boom there is a severe threat to their political support capital. The confidence gap of the seventies has developed into a culture of mistrust during the nineties. The process of governing and electioneering in the USA is destabilized by political cynicism and vanishing trust in central institutions and representatives of the political system. The essence of this article is the examination of the extent and causes of this political malaise. It also draws comparisons to the development of political trust in West European democracies.