Who is Paul Dekker? 

Paul Dekker is a researcher in the field of social and political participation, including studies of voluntary associations, religious involvement and the non-profit sector in comparative perspective. Besides, public opinion has been a main topic in Paul’s recent work, focussing particularly on the negative public mood in the Netherlands and attitudes towards government and the European Union.

Paul is a professor of Civil Society at Tilburg University, the Netherlands, and Head of the Participation and Government research unit of the Netherlands Institute for Social Research | SCP.

What will Paul be speaking about?

Paul will raise some intriguing questions like: what do we really measure when we measure political trust in public opinion? Is political trust as measured by opinion surveys the real thing? And when it’s not the real thing, could it be real in its consequences? What kind of trust do we want in a political democracy?

More about this speaker

View Paul’s profile at Tilburg University or view his profile at the SCP (in Dutch).