Loss of trust leads collapse in government; what predicts loss of trust?

Steve Lombardo penned this op/ed in Forbes: Collapse In Trust Is A Good Predictor Of Collapse In Governments

In January Edelman released its annual, global Trust Barometer study, which revealed a severe breakdown in government trust, globally and in particular in Europe. In 2008, in the aftermath of the economic crisis, trust in business plummeted, and the public took away the “keys to the car” and gave them to government. Four years later, as government failed to adequately react to the economic crisis in the eyes of the people, they’ve taken them away again. The majority of countries in our study now distrust government. This was particularly so in Europe, with government trust being well below the 50 percent mark in Ireland, Germany, U.K., Russia, Poland, Italy, France, and Spain. Over the past year, trust in government plummeted among informed publics in Spain, France and Italy, by 23 points, 18 points and 14 points respectively. In addition, nearly two-thirds of EU citizens believed their country was off on the wrong track, and six in ten did not trust government leaders to tell the truth at all. Each of these countries had un-sustainable “trust scores” and that turned out to be a good predictor of whether those governments would flip.

The loss of trust in business and government is not a changing trend, it's more like a correction in social mood's bear market. There was a brief rally in 2009, but in China and Europe, the rally ran out of stream and things started getting worse in 2010. The public didn't lose trust in government, it's just that business became the focal point of negative mood. Trust is down across the board and it's just a matter of where they turn their attention. Here's Lombardo's conclusion:

Trust is what people believe you will do in the future (and this is true for business as well as government). In that context, European governments and others need to begin work on securing trust of their citizenry or risk the same cycle in the next round of elections.

I would deliver similar advice, but more concrete. You cannot control public mood, but you can deflect it. Implement radical policies (not necessarily far-left or far-right, but radical in the sense of unexpected bold moves that shock Europe) and treat the EU Commission and IMF as your enemy. Create conflict with them to satisfy the peoples' desire for conflict, while benefiting your regime. This can either be done honestly (fixing the economies of Europe requires a bit of anti-EU and anti-IMF policy) or cynically; if done honestly it will have lasting results. Cynical governments may stay in power longer, but they will fall hard and face the scorn of historians. To put it simply, implement positive policies to move your nation forward while directing negative social mood towards tertiary, coincident and ultimately inconsequential (the more abstract the better) targets.

The real problem is that the European political class doesn't want to change. They are invested in the status quo and that is why they are the target of negative social mood. People want change and they are not getting it. This is why the right stands to gain: the public will play round robin with political parties until one of them changes the game. It can come from the far left where the far-left is anti-free trade, but it will most likely come from the far-right because in Europe, many far right parties marry left-wing economics with right-wing cultural issues. European leftists are international socialists, rightists are national socialists. Europeans want to keep their socialism, but they also want nationalism.