Stop complaining about the trust deficit | OTT Conference 2026 session summary

Session purpose

This session explored what trust means for think tanks, civil society organisations and policy actors working in very different political and social contexts. It asked how trust is built, lost, transferred and protected — with governments, communities, funders, partners and wider publics.

The session focused on the practical and human dimensions of trust: visibility, listening, empathy, political awareness, coalition-building, transparency and long-term relationship investment.

Main conveners and contributors

The session was convened around contributions from several participants and organisations, including:

• Jorge Morel (IEP), who shared reflections and evidence from Peru on trust in civil society, political institutions and think tanks.
• Margarita Beneke De Sanfeliu (FUSADES), who presented insights from El Salvador on how visibility, recognition and communication shape organisational trust.
• Rakesh Rajani (Just Systems), who offered a central reflection on building trust with government actors through listening, humility and political understanding.
• Participants from different regions, including Kazakhstan, Kenya, Singapore, Germany and the OECD, who contributed examples and challenges from their own contexts.

Main presentation and framing

The main framing of the session was that trust is not universal or static. It depends on context, history, politics, identity, organisational visibility and the nature of the relationship between actors.

Examples from Peru and El Salvador showed how different trust environments can be. In Peru, political trust is extremely low, while civil society and think tanks may still retain relatively higher levels of credibility. In El Salvador, by contrast, public trust in the President is high, while trust in civil society and independent actors is far more fragile.

The presentation also highlighted that trust does not begin with abstract credibility. It often starts with three basic conditions:

1. People know the organisation exists.
2. They recognise what it does.
3. They believe its work improves their lives or serves a useful purpose.

This led to a broader discussion about visibility, communication and whether organisations are sufficiently present in the communities and policy spaces where they seek to be trusted.

Main debates

1. Trust is context-specific

Participants agreed that trust varies significantly across countries, institutions and communities. The same type of actor — a think tank, politician, religious leader, business leader, academic or activist — may be trusted in one setting and distrusted in another.

An interactive exercise showed that participants tended to trust scientists, public servants and young activists more, while politicians, business leaders and religious leaders attracted more scepticism. Trust in academics and the military was more ambivalent and depended heavily on national histories.

2. Visibility matters, but visibility is not the same as trust

A key debate focused on whether organisations need to be more visible to be trusted. Participants agreed that people cannot trust organisations they do not know. However, visibility does not always mean public branding, media presence or personal profiles.

For some organisations, particularly those working on sensitive issues such as national security or politically contested topics, trust may depend on quiet presence, discretion and long-term relationships rather than public visibility.

The group also discussed the risks of trust transfer. Being associated with a trusted partner can strengthen credibility, but association with an unpopular or distrusted actor — including government — can damage it.

3. Trust with government starts with listening

Rakesh Rajani challenged think tanks and civil society organisations to rethink how they engage with politicians and public servants. Too often, organisations approach the government with pre-packaged solutions, evidence and recommendations without first asking what officials need, what pressures they face or what political constraints they are managing.

One example from Bihar illustrated this clearly: a government official responsible for dozens of urgent issues and 58 memoranda of understanding had very little time or mental bandwidth to absorb new ideas. The lesson was that trust-building requires empathy, patience and a willingness to listen before proposing solutions.

The session stressed that effective engagement with the government requires political savviness. Think tanks must understand incentives, institutional pressures and political realities, rather than assuming that evidence alone will shift decisions.

4. Coalitions can build trust across difference

Participants discussed how coalitions can expand trust by bringing together actors who would not normally work together. Examples included alliances involving civil society, youth groups, businesses, UN agencies, feminist organisations and think tanks.

A case from El Salvador showed that organisations with different ideologies can collaborate when they focus on a shared objective — such as reducing violence in public transport — and agree to respect their differences.

However, the group also recognised that trust often forms around similarity: ethnicity, class, race, gender, ideology or political identity. This can make trust exclusionary. Participants from Kenya and Europe reflected on how identity, ethnicity and far-right politics can shape who is trusted and who is dismissed.

5. Should think tanks develop trust marks?

Another debate focused on whether think tanks should adopt common standards or certification mechanisms to signal credibility. Participants discussed the possibility of “trust marks” based on transparency, independence, peer review, governance and openness about funding.

Such mechanisms could help protect organisations from political interference and give new audiences a way to assess credibility. But participants also recognised that formal standards are not enough. Trust is relational and must still be earned through behaviour, consistency and accountability.

Main takeaways

• Trust is dynamic. It can be built, lost and rebuilt. It requires continuous attention to context, relationships and changing political conditions.
• Think tanks and civil society organisations need to listen more and talk less, especially when engaging with government actors and communities.
• Trust-building should begin with the priorities of the people or institutions an organisation wants to engage, not only with donor agendas or organisational strategies.
• Visibility matters, but it must be understood broadly. Trust can be built through communication, presence, consistency, coalition-building and service — not only through media profile or branding.
• Coalitions can extend trust beyond familiar networks, but they require clear shared goals and respect for difference.
• Trust-building takes time. It often exceeds the length of project cycles and requires long-term investment in relationships.
• Transparency, independence and peer review can help signal credibility, but they should complement, not replace, human relationships and accountability.