Institutionalized money trust replaces countless individual acts of personal trust

Evidence

These considerations confirm our conjecture that, under the conditions set by civilized society, personal trust becomes a type of system trust in the ability of systems to maintain conditions or performances which are, within certain limits, identical. Other examples of system trust also show this characteristically reflex engagement with fictions that is functioning. For example, whether one is a member or outsider, one trusts large organized systems which process goods or data, although one knows that the objectives of these systems are not the goals of the people who work in them. Rather one knows that everyone concerned in them must be motivated by complex, prone-to-failure and not readily visible detours to produce four-fruit jam, insurance notices, or whatever. The purchasing power of money is trusted, although currency is known to rest on an overdraft, so to speak, and is not covered by a corresponding value in the institutions which issue the currency. It rests instead on the expectation, supported by experience, that not everyone wants to turn his money credits into real cash simultaneously. One relies on the fact that the state has the power to guarantee peace and make decisions about problems, although one knows that its power of coercion is not adequate to do these things, if a considerable percentage of the population were to rebel at the same time or refuse to recognize decisions. — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 257 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Personal trust becomes system trust under civilized conditions — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 257; System trust rests on trusting that others also trust — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 261; Social complexity forces the shift from personal to impersonal, system-governed trust. (+10 more)

Related

• Personal trust becomes system trust under civilized conditions (similarity 0.91)
• Trust requires freedom be transferred from uncontrollable potency to institutionalized personal responsibility. (similarity 0.91)
• Under modern states, personal safety depends on patronage chains rather than kin groups (similarity 0.89)
• Modern trust takes the form of trust in specialized information processing (similarity 0.88)
• Social complexity forces the shift from personal to impersonal, system-governed trust. (similarity 0.87)
• System trust operates independently of individuals’ personal readiness to trust (similarity 0.87)
• Social institutions function through trust only at the individual micro level (similarity 0.86)
• Modern society needs non-personal trust beyond what individuals provide (similarity 0.86)
• Trust extends kin-group loyalty outward to the whole society (similarity 0.86)
• Trust in experts is trust in impersonal systems, not in individuals (similarity 0.85)
• System trust rests on trusting that others also trust (similarity 0.85)
• Trust in money is system trust in a function, not in people. (similarity 0.85)
• Modern trust is vested in abstract capacities, not individuals (similarity 0.85)
• Money substitutes one generalized act for countless individual trust demonstrations (similarity 0.84)
• Trust reduces social complexity by replacing missing information with guaranteed security (similarity 0.84)

Broader Connections

• Personal trust becomes system trust under civilized conditions #corroborates (0.80) — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 257
• Social complexity forces the shift from personal to impersonal, system-governed trust. #corroborates (0.75)
• Modern society needs non-personal trust beyond what individuals provide #corroborates (0.75)
• System trust operates independently of individuals’ personal readiness to trust #expands (0.70)
• Trust rests on structural system guarantees that relieve individuals of risk assessment #expands (0.70)
• Modern trust takes the form of trust in specialized information processing #expands (0.65)
• System trust rests on trusting that others also trust #expands (0.60) — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 261
• Trust reduces social complexity by replacing missing information with guaranteed security #expands (0.60)
• System trust cannot supply the mutuality that personal trust provides #qualifies (0.50) — Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, 272