Digital Mind 🧠

🪵 The Threshold

Self-disclosure works because intimate information signals rare trust

Properties2
tagsja-picks, causal_relationships, singleton, xref, category/causal-relationships
aliases@luhmann_trust_2017, loc. 294, @gambetta_trust_1988, loc. 795, @luhmann_trust_2017, loc. 240

4 min read

Self-disclosure works because intimate information signals rare trust

Evidence

If one compares assurance in self-presentation with emotional attachment, the greater flexibility of the former becomes at once apparent. Its generalizing principle does not lie in the identity of an object, but in the identity of the presented self. In relation to its environment this self has selective interests. It can change its presentation’s situations and its attributes, and make itself independent of the fate of specific objects in the environment. The mode of reduction in self-presentation is not the fusing of outer and inner, as in emotional identification, but separating and maintaining boundaries. Boundary maintenance is practised by control of all information about the self which leaves the system. Thus the presented self can harmonize with a more complex environment, and hence show more diverse trust than the emotionally bound self, not in the sense of an uninhibited readiness for assimilation, but, on the contrary, in the sense of distancing, of far-reaching indifference and readiness to substitute, and hence, further, of strategically rational attitudes which thrive in a highly mobile, strongly differentiated social system. — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 294 (#complicates, via linked claim)

But there is another important class of cases where trust, in the sense that I wish to use the term, comes into play. This is when others know something about themselves or the world which I do not, and when - what I ought to do depends on the extent of my ignorance of these matters. An agreement between myself and such other people may call upon them to disclose their information. But can I trust them to be truthful; that is, can I trust them to send me the correct signals, those they would send if they were truly trustworthy? (They do not actually have to be truthful for me to rely on them. As long as I always know how to interpret their messages correctly I can trust them. Thus the ancient Cretan was as informative as a knowledgeable saint.) — Diego Gambetta, Trust - Making and Breaking Cooperative…, 795 (#complicates, via linked claim)

The basis of all trust is the presentation of the individual self as a social identity which builds itself up through interaction and which corresponds to its environment. Whoever presents himself from the outset as unapproachable – and this can be done in many different ways, such as by a snub, by walking past really quickly, by offending against customary demeanour or behaviour in a way which shows that one places no value on it – whoever distances himself in this way is in no position to acquire trust because he offers no opportunities for learning and testing. He may demonstrate that he is a relatively predictable factor in the situation, but one cannot trust him. Whoever wants to win trust must take part in social life and be in a position to build the expectations of others into his own self-presentation. — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 240 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

  • XREF: connects to: Erotic disclosure captures otherness by making us at home in the world — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre: The Riddle of…, 658; Trust requires interactive self-presentation, not mere predictable distance — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 240; Self-presentation sustains broader trust than emotional attachment by maintaining boundaries rather than fusing identities — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 294 (+9 more)

Broader Connections

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