Generalized social trust lacks grounding in specific relationships.

Evidence

Much of the fast-growing literature on the value of trust in society often focuses on the possibilities for social exchange that follow from generally trusting others (Luhmann 1980). Such generalized or social trust is trust in random others or in social institutions without grounding in specific prior or subsequent relationships with those others and, as is often argued or implied, without taking into account the variable grounds for trusting particular others to different degrees. — Russell Hardin, Trust and Trustworthiness, 313

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines Luhmann-style generalized/social trust as trust in strangers and institutions without relationship grounding — a precise target for the reader’s Luhmann integration.
• XREF: Directly engages the reader’s stated project: connecting Saramago’s blindness to Luhmann — note that generalized trust (trust without relationship grounding) is precisely what a sudden loss of observability would destroy.