Cultural Foundation of Policy Compliance in Crises: Evidence From East Asia

ABSTRACT This study explores the role of cultural values in shaping attitudes toward compliance with emergency measures during health crises, such as the COVID‐19 pandemic. While culture is a multi‐dimensional concept, scholars often rely on the individualism–collectivism dichotomy to explain the higher compliance observed in East Asian countries compared to the West. Beyond the simple dichotomies of previous studies, this study categorizes cultural characteristics of East Asian societies into four key aspects—anti‐pluralism, social hierarchy, social harmony, and group primacy. Based on the latest data from the 6th Asian Barometer Survey, the results of the analysis significantly support the idea that different aspects of cultural values have varying impacts on citizens' compliance with emergency measures within East Asian societies. Specifically, attitudes toward anti‐pluralism and social hierarchy are more strongly associated with higher compliance than those toward social harmony and group primacy. The results examining the interaction with trust in government also show that the influence of cultural values persists, even when such trust is low.