Distrust of government arises from generalization over humans and fiction

Evidence

This distrust is often very likely founded in a crude but sufficient theoretical grasp of the humans who inhabit their world and the world of Russian fiction, from whom generalization is easy. — Russell Hardin, Trust and Trustworthiness, 756

Categorization

• QUESTION: Hardin asserts that fictional characters supply the raw material for generalizing distrust of government figures — a striking claim about fiction’s epistemic role worth chasing.
• XREF: connects to: Republicanism distrusts the powerful, not the ordinary people, who need restraint. — Philip Pettit, Republicanism: A Theory of Freedom and…, 947; Officials’ generalization of the NLF to a category obscured its reality — Marianne DeKoven, Utopia Limited: The Sixties and the…, 711