A recently released public opinion poll on electoral and other matters prepared by Leger Marketing for Elections Canada has good and bad news for the country. The good news is that most Canadians trust the electoral agency and believe the country has fair elections. This data, collected in the spring, comes as Americans grow increasingly wary of their contests, as expressed in the longevity of “stop the steal” Republican politicking. But reading beyond the data on elections, the numbers are less encouraging.

Trust is essential to democracy. It’s currency. It’s glue. It’s the stuff that makes living together and sorting out our differences possible. It’s what keeps people showing up. In Canada, trust is low in key areas of social and political life. And it’s hard to blame people for this widespread mistrust. Leger found that a full 66 percent of respondents “agree that they do not think the government cares about what people like them think.” The findings are consistent with a belief that politics is too complicated to understand (52 percent agreed) and that all parties are the same (43 percent agreed).

For a country run by a political class backed by technocrats and communications professionals, none of this should be surprising. Canada is a liberal democracy, emphasizing the representative nature of that system, which tends to keep people at distance from self-government. It’s no surprise that over time, people pick up on the message that their government asks and expects very little from them beyond participation in the labor market, paying taxes, and perhaps voting once every few years in one election or another.