Introduction

The importance of trust in government, social capital, and political beliefs as drivers of compliance has been analysed since the onset of the COVID-19 crisis, as comprehensively reviewed by ^{Fancourt, Steptoe & Wright (2020}); ^{Giuliano and Rasul (2020}). In a recent paper, ^{Drylie-Carey, Sánchez-Castillo & Galán-Cubillo (2020}) even discussed the European leaders’ communication strategy on Twitter during the pandemic and highlighted the importance of political communication. The issue of trust in government is extremely relevant and actual. People around the globe in 2020 have been imposed very demanding limitations on some of the most important civil rights in the form of social distancing and isolation, travel restrictions and closure of many activities and leisure centers. These measures have had strong effects at both the societal and the economical level, such as job loss, increasing unemployment rates, significant GDP losses and mental well-being issues (World Health Organization, 2020). Therefore, in such a unique situation, examining the levels of public trust is of paramount importance. This is both because, on one hand, public institutions must inspire trust in their citizens to make said measures effective through collective compliance, while, on the other hand those very same institutions need to trust their citizens in order to contain the spread of the disease and progress with their sanitary, economic and social recovery plans.

Therefore, this paper is focused on public trust, with particular attention on the importance of political leaders' speeches during the COVID-19 crisis. This research analyses speeches from the British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, the Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte and the Chinese President Jinping Xi during the COVID-19 pandemic, specifically around the beginning of the crisis and at its peak, while comparing the public trust levels in the three countries. Due to the different political systems between China and its European counterparts, conclusions are drawn not only based on the speech analysis of the political leaders, but also by considering that a comprehensive evaluation is the result of different cultural backgrounds and social systems.

Drawing from Habermas (see Habermas, 2000: 22-23; see also ^{Cooke, 1997}; Habermas, 1984) and ^{Bourdieu’s (see Bourdieu, 1991}) theories about authentic and strategic communication, I analyses the effectiveness of different speech styles of political leaders and the ways they communicate with the public. Different speeches have led to different public reflections and reactions. While Boris Johnson’s speeches can be considered decisive but cold and often detached, Conte’s communication has often been more inclusive, encouraging and even friendly at times. Chinese President Jinping Xi showed instead a combination of authoritative and compelling manners when communicating to the Chinese public. Accordingly, the public trust in Boris Johnson's government as a source of information about coronavirus has declined substantially since April 2020, along with trust in politicians and news organisations in general. Conversely, the Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte earned significant credit during the battle against the pandemic. Finally, survey data for China shows a significantly higher level of public trust in Jinping Xi and the government compared to both the UK and Italy (Edelman, 2020).

The relations between authentic and strategic communication

It is well known that political speech plays a critical role when members of the public are evaluating politicians. Specifically, voters in liberal democracies seek for determined qualities in political leaders (Bailenson et al., 2008; ^{Lalancette; Raynauld, 2019}). Speech plays a key role in the interpretation of a message for many reasons, as speech is perceived as the best tool to effectively present information that is relevant in a political debate (^{Birdsell; Groarke, 2007}; Alonso-Muñoz; Casero-Ripollés, 2020). During the initial spread of COVID-19 worldwide, most of the politicians’ speeches were broadcast in full on national television in the form of press conferences, thus reaching not only the audience physically present in the auditorium but also the nation as a whole. As a consequence, such speeches have been very much a showcase for each politician and have inevitably led to comparisons between them in terms of their respective leadership qualities.

It is therefore important to define the notion of authenticity in communication in order for politicians to appear trustworthy when communicating to their own citizens. "Authentic communication" include speeches characterized by sincerity and truthfulness, whereby sincerity implies saying what you mean, that is openly showing your intentions, thoughts and feelings (see ^{Bohman and Rehg, 2014}). Truthfulness means to say what is true. (Williams, 2010:20). These two terms are central for Habermas and Bourdieu, who have used them as a way to measure an actor’s authenticity and to define the necessary conditions for communication to be perceived as authentic. The literature below will focus on the two perspectives of communication: authentic and strategic communication.

Previous studies (see ^{Holdo, 2020}; Ojha & Ojha, 2006; ^{Benson, 2009}) have considered Habermas's theories as the basis of authentic communication, while using Bourdieu's perspective to understand why actors comply with sincerity and truthfulness. However, in the context of political communication, we need to combinate ethics and motivation. In fact, in order to earn the trust of citizens, political leaders must recognize that sincerity and honesty are both right and needed. Hence, discussing authentic communication and strategic communication is of great significance to understand political leaders' speech to the public during COVID-19.

Habermas's central claim about communication is that authenticity allow for a deeper and more sustainable collaboration than strategic communication. By ensuring a mutual understanding, actors can reach agreements which are not influence by their self-interest (see Habermas, 2000:22-23; See also ^{Cook, 1997}; Habermas,1984). This ethically oriented approach can in fact explain how people build trusting relationships by not using strategy or be driven by self-interest when communicating. For instance, secret conversations between friends, religious confessions, and therapy are types of communications that could not be maintained if participants don't believe that the other actors are sincere and authentic. Similarly, the efficacy of political communication critically depends on the speaker's ability to convince the audience about their sincerity and authenticity. A politician who is exclusively guided by self-interest is not a good politician, in any political or societal system. This distinction between goal- and interest-oriented conversations and selfless, sincere communication is necessary for understanding effective political discourse (^{Holdo, 2019}; Markowitz,2010; Williams,2010). This dichotomy suggests that, on the one hand, political communication is just a strategy and a tool to convince people. However, at the same time, it must also entail truth and have people’s interests at its heart; in other words, its goals must be connected to people's experiences, feelings, and values for it to be meaningful.

In fact, experienced political leaders, especially in electoral systems, must use authentic communication. Political promises made during campaigning become meaningless if people do not believe them to be truthful. Similarly, in international politics, negotiators are more effective if the other side considers them trustworthy. In general, authentic communication enables to reach a consensus without relying solely on self-interest or coercion of the audience. Instead, authentic communication makes communication effective by exploring shared beliefs and considering the audience’s perspectives (^{Holdo, 2019}; O 'mahony, 2010).

Bourdieu's view of real (or "selfless") communication, on the other hand, is quite different from Habermas's. In Bourdieu's works, the concepts of truth and authenticity are viewed as as strategic tools (Bourdieu, 1991) and may, in principle, serve any political purpose (^{Holdo, 2020}). Bourdieu basically argues that communication always involves some level of struggle between actors with different interests, social status and ways of power. As for truthful and really authentic communication, Bourdieu believes it to be too idealistic, without any real value (e.g. Bourdieu, 1991) and more as a tool for hiding power relations and governance techniques (Holdo, 2020). In other words, Bourdieu thinks that real, non-strategic communication between people is impossible and power interests shape all forms of communication. As he puts it: "the relationship of language is always the relationship of power" (Bourdieu and Vacante, 1992:118), and "the power of words is nothing more than the delegation power of spokesmen" (Bourdieu, 1991:107).

Methodology

The article analyses two speeches delivered by the Chinese President Xi Jinping in February and in April 2020: "Speech on Wuhan COVID-19 outbreak" (Xinhua News Agency, 2020) and "Speech on the deployment of resumption of economic after the pandemic" (Xinhua News Agency, 2020). British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s delivered daily press conferences on the spread of the COVID-19 across March and April 2020 (Prime Minister's Office, 2020). This article focusses on the speeches given on March 3^rd, March 12^th as well as on the public panic caused by the absence of British Prime Minister Boris Johnson in April. Finally, Italian Prime Minister Conte's speeches (Italian Government and Administrative Adviser, 2020) was excerpted from March 9^th and 11^th when the outbreak was in its early stages in Italy; and in April, when the pandemic was largely contained but lockdown continued to be deployed. The timing of political leaders' speeches is based on the phases of the pandemic as announced by governments and classified as the early stage beginning and peak of the pandemic. This temporal classification approximately matches the epidemic curves reporting the number of new daily cases and deaths as gathered from the respective official government dashboards reporting on the evolution of the pandemic. Specifically, the peak was identified to be in early February in China, late March in Italy and late April in the UK. Following on this temporal classification for each country, this research employs mixed methods, including language and discourse analyses of the speeches retrieved from the official government websites, as detailed above.

The following line charts show the ups and downs of the approval rating of governments as surveyed by British, Italian and Chinese citizens and will be extensively commented over the course of the entire manuscript (Edelman, 2020).

Data forXi Jinping only refers to January and May 2020. Data retrieved from the 2020 Edelman Trust Barometer Spring Update: Trust and the Covid-19 Pandemic.

Figure 1 Comparison between the approval ratings of Boris Johnson and Giuseppe Conte from January to October 2020.  

A comparison between UK, Italy and China political leader's speech.

The factors impacting on public trust

Based on the discussion above, public trust is vitally important to ensure both stable leadership and cohesion of the public. Especially in the context of the pandemic, a high level of public trust is crucial for ensuring full public compliance with the rules formulated by the government. As ^{Llewellyn (2020}) argues very clearly: “in times of crisis, trust is the most important thing to consider if you want to communicate health advice.” The author suggests that increasing the public’s sense of control should be part of future policy. Building trust with the public should be a core theme of every government’s ongoing pandemic strategy, particularly as we look at easing lockdown restrictions and returning to some form of normality. The public needs to trust in the government being sensitive to the fears and anxieties that people are experiencing, and that the government can put in place the right strategy to respond. The public needs to perceive that some institutions can do something about the pandemic and protect them. This argument is bilateral, because, at the same time, the government needs to trust the public to be compliant and then implement the next phases of their plans.

Accordingly, UK insisted that its actions were all being “led by science”, a phrase that the British public has become accustomed to hearing from Boris Johnson’s press conferences. However, the “led by the science” rhetoric has not been without criticism. In fact, the relationship between public trust and science in the UK has been historically weak. For instance, in 2019, the NHS Health Research Authority (HRA) launched the “Make it Public” campaign with the aim of “enhancing public trust in research evidence and enhancing public accountability.” Hence, scientific uncertainty regularly results in political manipulation and debates about communicating complicated models to the public. Scientific models, in particular, are frequent subjects of political contestation, as in the case of climate change, because of their inherent uncertain. COVID-19, as a novel coronavirus, is defined by uncertainty. This is perhaps most readily apparent in models predicting the virus’ spread, which have been plagued by limited data and the emerging scientific assumptions about transmission and public health interventions.

As a result, the “led by the science” approach has not enjoyed widespread approval in the UK, as showed by recent opinion polls that reported a significant fall in public trust in the UK’s handling of the pandemic (Edelman, 2020). This is worrying; because doubts and a loss of confidence during an outbreak may influence public behavioral responses. Falling opinion polls may not be the only negative consequences to consider. Despite reporting adherence to social distancing measures, people may be reporting a loss of meaning and self-worth. Therefore, in this context, strategic communication and tougher leadership are key factors in winning public trust as well as ease public mistrust of scientific communication. To deal with the immediate crisis, public administration needs to explore institutional reforms that focus on more leadership and sincere communication (Meier, 1997) in public health while emphasizing the importance of transparency, compassion, empathy, and evidence.

On the other hand, the Italian government, even though not exempt from critics of mishandling some aspects of the pandemic, enjoyed a more positive response from the public in terms of trust throughout the health crisis. It is worth noting here that the high levels of trust experienced by Conte’s government during the pandemic are in contrast with the relatively low levels of institutional trust characteristic of Italy, both historically and in recent surveys. In fact, the Italian public has historically shown a widespread attitude of distrust towards the same public authorities that it now needs to rely on (^{Falcone, 2020}). This phenomenon of increased trust can be partly explained by the charisma and communication style of Conte, which gained him high approval rating, as well as the need from the public for a public authority to trust. A pandemic like COVID-19, caused by an unknown illness for which there is no cure, inevitably generates anxiety and fear and, as a result, the need for a public authority to trust. The Italian public did feel this need, and Conte represented the perfect face and personality to rely upon, thanks to his calm, emphatic and personable communication style.

Finally, polls from May 2020 revealed that the public trust in the Chinese government during the pandemic as risen to 95 percent, which is up 5 points from the last survey in January, giving the country its top ranking among the surveyed countries (Edelman, 2020). Such a high-scoring level of trust in the government may seem unconventional in Western systems, but by analyzing the socio-cultural background of China, along with Jinping Xi's speeches, I find that there is a strong basis for public trust in the Chinese government from Chinese people.

First of all, China was the first country in the world to experience the COVID-19 outbreak and, at least in the initial stages, it was more serious compared other countries because of relative unpreparedness. Because of being faced with an aggressive disease without prior knowledge of or cure for it, Chinese leaders acted relatively late than expected, despite appearing in front of the public. This evidence also can be found with political leaders in Italy and the UK, who have appeared on press conferences when there were already several confirmed cases in their respective countries. As Jinping Xi's first appeared at a governmental meeting, Chinese-style propaganda tactics spread among the public. By searching comments on the NetEase's news app, I found that most of the messages from the public tended to support the government's decisions. Such messages included "Don't cause trouble to President Xi", "Let's build a great China", "We will win this war" and "come on, strong people of Wuhan, we all support you". At the same time, I tracked some negative views about the lack of transparency in some of the data, statements from the local governments and complaints about the slow reaction of the Wuhan local government. I noticed that these remarks were mainly directed at local governments. In order to support this inference, I contacted people who were critical of the local government.

On the one hand, interviewees believe that in the early stage, the local government in Wuhan ignored the severity of the virus. This led to a lot of rumors around the source of the virus at the end of January, causing anger and distrust in local officials. On the other hand, the interviewees greatly approved the central government action aimed at correcting the idleness and inaction of local officials. In other words, they praised the central government for its leadership in mobilizing other local governments to support Wuhan. This trend generally fits with Xi Jinping policies. In fact, since he took office, he has been severely punishing local government officials for inaction and corruption, which led to increased public trust in the central government as an effective and practical government.

However, it might also be argued that authoritarian blindness, which has been the perennial problem of the Chinese system, with its centralized, top-down administration has now showed again. Such authoritarian blindness may lead to a decline in public trust in future. This is because instead of openly reporting massive failures, the local governments always report ever-increasing surpluses and positive news, both because they are afraid of reporting bad news and because they want to please their superiors. Despite this chronic issue of the Chinese political and administrative system, China seems to have dealt with the health crisis comparatively better than other countries, for instance by avoiding a second wave of infections (at least at present) and containing the number of deaths to relatively low numbers.

Nevertheless, whether COVID-19 proves the superiority of Chinese authoritarianism can only be judged by the containment degree of the coronavirus in the long term. What seems plausible at this stage is the link between trust in the government and success in containing the virus. If citizens trust the state, they will see its directives as reasonable, worth following and will comply with the regulations. To this end, the Chinese authoritarian political systems achieved greater legitimacy than liberal democratic counterparts. In modern China, the authoritarian political system is understood differently from the common western conception of "authoritarianism", as it is inextricably blended with the key Confucian concept of social harmony. According to the principles of Confucianism, a society is effective when power and authority are organized hierarchically. In such a hierarchy, the rulers and the government are viewed as a paternalistic authority that endeavors to ensure the well-being and unity of the common people. In return, the task of each individual is to fulfill their duties by faithfully following directives (^{Ng, 2000}).

The result of this legitimacy and loyalty is that citizens' trust in leaders increases and public health crises are handled more effectively. In addition, years of grass-roots political experience has enabled Xi to mobilize public confidence, strength and emotion in its speech on the fight against the epidemic. What seems less clear, however, is a correlation between efficacy of the containment measures and regime type. While some autocracies have contained the virus to relatively low level, like Singapore, others have done very poorly, like Iran. Similarly, some democracies have stumbled, like the UK, the United States and many other European countries are experiencing a second wave of infections, while others have performed admirably, like South Korea and Taiwan.

Discussion and conclusion

From the start of the pandemic, it has been clear that this was going to be more than just a public health crisis. At the heart of the pandemic and its implications has been the question of public trust, the relationship between consent and authority, self-interest and solidarity. By comparing Jinping Xi, Giuseppe Conte and Boris Johnson's speeches throughout the pandemic, I found out what people want from their politicians are strong and feasible promises from the central government and a call for unity and confidence to fight against the virus.

We have referred to the definition of 'authentic communication' in the literature review section. A review of the speeches of political leaders reveals that these politicians have tried to adopt an authentic style of communication. However, the levels of success in gaining public trust have been different according to their respective political system, cultural background and policies. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson's style tends to be objective, scientific, based on hard evidence and advocating for practical measures. However, this strategy has not been ideal, as the levels of public trust dropped during the crisis. Italian Prime minister adopted a more personable approach and projected an image of competence, empathy, reassurance, and personal sharing. These qualities resulted in an increased trust from the Italian public which sharply contrasts with the historical trend of distrust in Italian institutions. Jinping Xi's speeches are sincere and call for unity, while being permeated by a tone of authority. As a result, Chinese citizens’ approval of the government has reached much higher levels compared to the western counterparts.

As COVID-19 threatens the health of communities across the globe, the success of governmental measures depends largely on the levels of compliance, which will in turn depend on the confidence that citizens have in their leaders. In this circumstance, it is necessary to delivery strategic and authentic speeches and information to the public. A combination of strategic and authentic communication seems to be inevitably needed to deal with a public health crisis. However, the extent to which this combination needs to be applied depends on the societal system and political environment.

In this sense, President Xi did not need to use a very strong warning tone or to explicitly exhort the public to abide by the rules, since authoritarianism has been the principle pursued by China's ruling party and Chinese citizens trust their government as being effective and resolute. Instead, the spirit of the President’s speeches is more caring and inspiring. On the contrary, in the UK, a country founded on deep ideals of liberal democracy, the Prime Minister has tried to convey a rational and scientific voice in the face of the crisis. However, the public did not fully trust and abide by the statement of the British government and the scientists' team. This may be because the attitude conveyed by Boris Johnson in his speeches is not a strong and firm one; Johnson’s point of view always sounded more like a scientific suggestion, rather than an effective way to curb the spread of the disease. In addition, the British Prime Minister did not "stand among the masses" in the course of the health crisis, which can be seen from the separation of the concepts of government, NHS and the British people in Boris Johnson's speeches. Finally, Boris's absence from the press conferences in April, which was at the peak of the pandemic in the UK, has largely dampened public trust in the government.

On the contrary, Chinese citizens mostly praised the strength and effectiveness of Jinping Xi in dealing with disease. However, this does not mean that the satisfaction between the local government and central government is consistent. The public trust in the central government is related to the satisfaction of local residents, who have often criticized local government for inaction and downplaying the severity of the virus. Chinese political leaders should re-consider the power dynamic between central and local government and take these points into account in order to strengthen future speeches.

In the case of Italy, the image of competence and personal sharing created by Conte largely earned the trust of Italian citizens and earned him approval. Even though the actions of the Italian government have not been spared from critics, the public trust in Conte’s government has been high, especially considering that Italy has recently been affected by a progressive erosion of trust in public institutions and a general state of information crisis regarding matters of health and science (^{Lovari, 2020}). However, a savvy use communication channels, such as social media, combined with his personality, have helped Conte project a very positive image of himself and earn trust.

In conclusion, a leader’s response to a crisis is much more than speeches. Surely, the ways of communication play a key role in obtaining the public’s trust and co-operation. However, political leaders also face the monumental task of reassuring the public and persuading them to follow through on government decisions. This article showed that achieving collective compliance and trust is not trivial because the negotiation between the government and its citizens depends on the different social system, circumstances and particular situation in different countries. In this case, every country is a different case. In Asia, especially in China and Japan, there has always been a historical habit of wearing face masks. This habit stems from paying special attention to respiratory health problems (^{Fillmore, 2018}), protecting from smog or avoiding breathing in cold air. This cultural habit has surely made it easier for the Chinese central government to achieve compliance from the public compared than in the other two countries. Conversely, mask wearing has been met with skepticism and hesitation by the general public in UK and Italy, at least during the initial stages of the pandemic. The deeper reason for such differences is that in Western democracies plurality and freedom have been at odds with the restrictive measures imposed by the governments. This apparent incompatibility has been tackled with very different strategies in the UK and Italy, and it seems fair to state that the friendly and sharing manners of Giuseppe Conte have proved more effective than the cold, scientific and fact-driven strategy of Boris Johnson in terms of earning public trust. However, in China, while the government had to deal with the chronic problem of authoritarianism blindness as well as international critics, the sincere but firm and resolute tones adopted by Xi Jinping ensured an even higher level of trust in the government compared to the beginning of the pandemic.