Trust in police and legal system high among refugees , Date: 2024.07.16, format: Report, area: Authority

The Brief Analysis "Institutional trust of refugees in Germany" by the Research Centre of the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF-FZ) examines refugees' trust in key state institutions in Germany and compares the results with the trust of non-refugee immigrants and with people without a migration background. The results show that refugees have a higher level of trust in all the institutions included in the study than people in the other two groups.

Since 2016, refugees have been asked annually for their self-assessment with regard to various areas of life as part of the IAB-BAMF-SOEP Survey of Refugees. The Brief Analysis on refugees' institutional trust is based on data from the 2021 survey. Its aim is to find out how much refugees trust the police, the legal system, the federal parliament (Bundestag), politicians and political parties in Germany.

Portrait of a woman Dr. Amrei Maddox Source: @ BAMF

"Refugees express more trust in all institutions than immigrants without refugee experience and than people without a migration background. Across all groups, the greatest trust is placed in the police, followed by the legal system and the Bundestag", says Dr Amrei Maddox, researcher at the BAMF-FZ. By contrast, politicians and political parties are trusted the least. "The analyses suggest that the overall higher level of institutional trust among refugees is primarily due to the fact that immigrants base their assessment of German institutions on the political and social conditions in their country of origin. Very often, these are less democratic or non-democratic countries of origin, which is why refugees evaluate the institutions in Germany all the more favourably by comparison", explains Dr Maddox. This finding can also explain the differences in institutional trust between refugees and non-refugee immigrants - the democratic situation in the country of origin seems to be the frame of reference for the assessment of key state institutions in Germany.

Unlike previous studies, the Brief Analysis differentiates further within the group of immigrants. The result is that not all immigrants have a higher level of trust in institutions per se. Rather, it is refugees who have a particularly high level of trust in the German institutions analysed here. Future surveys will show whether refugees maintain their relatively high level of trust, or whether negative personal experiences they may have in Germany diminsh their level of trust in German institutions.


Institutional trust of refugees in Germany format: brief analysis, This download is available in other languages, too.

The BAMF Brief Analysis 2|2024 examines the trust in the central German institutions among refugees who came to Germany between 2013 and 2019 compared to immigrants without refugee experience and people without a migration background.