Personal trust attaches where an individual’s personality is structurally irreplaceable

Evidence

It seems that personal trust is only formed where it is needed. This is the case – even today – if the individual personality takes on a social-structural relevance, if the configuration of interaction relationships is arranged in the social system in such a way that it can only be arranged thus and now has to be restructured after that individual ceases to be involved. — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 204

Categorization

• DEFINE: This is Luhmann’s precise operational definition of when ‘personal’ trust (vs. system trust) applies: personality with social-structural relevance.