Confidence targets ability while trust targets disposition or motivation

Evidence

Luhmann (this volume) suggests reserving the term ‘confidence’ for ‘trust’ in the ability of social institution (e.g. the market) to function as is expected of it. Likewise, it seems to me, we show ‘confidence’ in our doctor’s ability to cure us of our ailments, in our teacher’s ability to inspire us, in our civil servants’ ability to take the correct decisions, and so on. Thus confidence stems from ability, and trust from a person’s underlying disposition or motivation. — Diego Gambetta, Trust - Making and Breaking Cooperative…, 799

Categorization

• DEFINE: Core conceptual distinction crucial to the Luhmann/Hardin synthesis: ‘confidence’ = faith in institutions, ‘trust’ = faith in persons’ motives.
• XREF: The confidence/trust split maps onto Hardin and Luhmann: in Blindness all institutional confidence collapses once the state fails, leaving only interpersonal trust.
• SEED: An essay essay could trace how the blind characters’ institutional confidence dissolves into purely dispositional trust as modernity’s systems stop functioning.