Trust accompanies governance effectiveness in Lampung student survey

A cross-sectional survey of 475 active students involved in student organizations at Universitas Lampung, Indonesia, found that power asymmetry and coordination fragmentation were negatively associated with organizational trust and collaborative governance effectiveness. Symbolic participation was positively associated with both outcomes, and organizational trust was positively associated with governance effectiveness. The researchers analyzed the data using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling, or PLS-SEM, to examine how power, participation, coordination and trust related within the university’s student-organization setting.

The study frames collaborative governance as a process shaped by formal institutional arrangements as well as power relations, participation, coordination and trust. Student organizations serve as a micro-political setting where authority, representation, collective interests and resource constraints intersect during deliberation, coordination and collective decision-making. The analysis examined five components: power asymmetry, symbolic participation, coordination fragmentation, organizational trust and collaborative governance effectiveness. Its explanatory, cross-sectional design supports statistical relationships among those components, but it does not establish that any one factor caused another.

PLS-SEM indicated that organizational trust partially mediated the relationships between the other factors and collaborative governance effectiveness. In statistical terms, trust accounted for part of the relationships linking power asymmetry, symbolic participation and coordination fragmentation to effectiveness. Specifically, power asymmetry and coordination fragmentation were negatively related to trust and effectiveness, whereas symbolic participation was positively related to both. Trust was also positively associated with effectiveness. These results describe the proposed relationships in the fitted model; they do not demonstrate a causal sequence or show that changing trust would necessarily change governance outcomes.

The result for symbolic participation is not evidence that students exercised substantial influence over organizational decisions. The authors said the measure may instead reflect recognition, social engagement and a sense of belonging despite limited substantive influence. Its positive association with trust and effectiveness can therefore coexist with students having little real control over collective choices. Similarly, the negative associations involving power asymmetry and coordination fragmentation do not identify particular practices that created those conditions, and the survey does not measure how the relationships developed over time.

The findings are limited to active students involved in student organizations at one Indonesian university. The cross-sectional survey design cannot determine temporal order, and the results may not generalize to other campuses, student populations or types of organizations. The model also concerns relationships within a specific organizational environment rather than governance outcomes across institutions. Even so, the study shows why the design of collaborative processes may matter at the smallest scale: uneven power, limited coordination and forms of participation that confer recognition without substantial influence can coexist in the same student-organization setting, with trust associated with how effectively collective governance operates.

Subject of Research: Relationships among power, participation, coordination, trust and collaborative governance effectiveness in Lampung student organizations

Article Title: Micropolitics of collaborative governance in student organizations in Lampung, Indonesia

Article References: Mukhlis, M., Marta, A., Mudayat, M., Fanani, A. F., & Pratama, M. Y. (2026). Micropolitics of collaborative governance in student organizations in Lampung, Indonesia. Frontiers in Political Science, 8, Article 1919921. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpos.2026.1919921

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.3389/fpos.2026.1919921

Keywords: collaborative governance, student organizations, organizational trust, power asymmetry, symbolic participation, coordination fragmentation, PLS-SEM, Universitas Lampung, Indonesia, micropolitics, collaborative, governance