Corruption next door, satisfaction at home: Spillover effects of corruption on political trust in China

How do political scandals in neighboring regions affect people’s evaluations of their own government? By investigating the spillover effects of corruption investigations on public political trust in China, this article finds that scandals in neighboring areas can trigger a contrast effect among the public. Corruption investigations in nearby regions positively influence people’s trust in their local government, suggesting that evaluations of an institution are shaped not only by the institution itself but also by the performance of comparable entities.