Trust in Consumer Markets: The Role of Consumer Policy and Market Norms Across 30 European Countries

Economic transactions involve concerns about seller honesty and product quality, requiring a baseline level of trust from consumers. While economic sociology has extensively studied how networks and market intermediaries foster trust, the role of social macrostructures has been examined less. This paper makes the case that consumer trust is embedded within institutions, operationalized as consumer policy, and culture, represented as market norms. To test our case, we analyze a pooled (2016–2020) dataset of the European Union survey on consumer trust and establish multidimensional indicators of consumer policy and market norms. We find a positive association between consumer policy and consumer trust, even when controlling for economic variables and the sociodemographic composition of countries. Furthermore, cross-level interactions show varied effects on social groups, as consumer policy disproportionately benefits the non-vulnerable. By adopting a comparative perspective on institutions with a focus on social-inequality, this study fills a lacuna in research on consumer trust.