Building mutual trust requires confronting risk rather than avoiding it

Evidence

Whoever trusts has to keep control over his own preparedness to accept the risks involved. He must make it clear to himself, if only to reassure himself, that he is not trusting unconditionally but rather within limits and in proportion to specific, rational expectations. It is himself he must curb and control when he puts his trust in someone or something. — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 161 (#qualifies, via linked claim)

Secondly, the action and hence the risks are avoidable: one does not have to engage in trade with another firm (although this implies forgoing the potential benefits of trade). Being able to avoid the relation is fundamental. If you could not, you might say something like: ‘I have no choice but to trust this person, institution, etc.’ Clearly, there being no choice, we need not invoke trust to explain our behaviour. Of course, as Luhmann (this volume) points out, whether or not a relation is seen to be avoidable is often highly subjective, and presumably varies in accordance with the structure of institutions and political power. — Diego Gambetta, Trust - Making and Breaking Cooperative…, 2510 (#contradicts, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Contracting, not trust, brings the future into the present; Overt risk calculation in contracts can undercut the trust it formalizes; Trust requires both freedom to defect and constraints that make cooperation attractive (+4 more)

Related

• Trust requires that the risky relationship be avoidable (similarity 0.92)
• Trust requires the trusting party also hold a choice to withdraw (similarity 0.86)
• Testing trust requires a concrete setting and visible relation to one’s own risk decisions (similarity 0.86)
• Contracting, not trust, brings the future into the present (similarity 0.86)
• Overt risk calculation in contracts can undercut the trust it formalizes (similarity 0.86)
• Trust requires both freedom to defect and constraints that make cooperation attractive (similarity 0.85)
• Trusting action increases one’s vulnerability to another whose behavior is uncontrolled (similarity 0.84)
• Trust is rational action taken despite uncontrolled exposure to loss (similarity 0.84)
• Trust governs dealings only where kinship and contract cannot constrain others (similarity 0.84)
• Trust solves problems of risk but operates only within a familiar world (similarity 0.84)
• Trust requires controlling one’s own readiness to accept risk (similarity 0.84)
• Trust is not chosen, a gamble, or an investment; only actions are (similarity 0.84)
• Trust cannot be demanded but only offered through vulnerability (similarity 0.84)
• Trust rests on structural system guarantees that relieve individuals of risk assessment (similarity 0.84)
• Trust requires genuine vulnerability and the partner’s real interest in betraying it (similarity 0.83)

Broader Connections

• Trust requires controlling one’s own readiness to accept risk #qualifies (0.82) — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 161
• Extending trust can create the trustworthy behavior it presumes #expands (0.80)
• Trust requires that the risky relationship be avoidable #contradicts (0.75) — Diego Gambetta, Trust - Making and Breaking Cooperative…, 2510