System trust survives individual disappointments that would destroy personal trust

Evidence

In the early development of the human individual, basic trust in stable circumstances of self-identity and the surrounding environment—ontological security—does not in the first instance rest upon a sense of the continuity of things or events. Rather, as we have noted, it derives from personal trust and establishes a need for trust in others which no doubt endures, in some form or another, throughout life. Trust in persons, as Erikson emphasises, is built upon mutuality of response and involvement: faith in the integrity of another is a prime source of a feeling of integrity and authenticity of the self. Trust in abstract systems provides for the security of day-to-day reliability, but by its very nature cannot supply either the mutuality or intimacy which personal trust relations offer. In this respect traditional religions are plainly different from modern abstract systems, because their personalised figures allow for a direct transfer of individual trust, with large elements of mutuality. In the case of abstract systems, by contrast, trust presumes faith in impersonal principles, which “answer back” only in a statistical way when they do not deliver the outcomes which the individual seeks. This is one of the main reasons why individuals at access points normally go to great pains to show themselves to be trustworthy: they provide the link between personal and system trust. — Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, 272 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: System trust is easier to acquire but harder to control than personal trust; System trust produces a compulsion to trust a system one cannot correct; System trust cannot supply the mutuality that personal trust provides — Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, 272 (+8 more)

Related

• System trust cannot supply the mutuality that personal trust provides (similarity 0.93)
• System trust produces a compulsion to trust a system one cannot correct (similarity 0.90)
• Modern society needs non-personal trust beyond what individuals provide (similarity 0.89)
• Personal intermediaries are the default route to new trust (similarity 0.88)
• System trust rests on expectations that most won’t test the system (similarity 0.88)
• System trust underwrites ontological security but yields no psychological reward (similarity 0.88)
• Personal trust becomes system trust under civilized conditions (similarity 0.87)
• Reflexive personal trust enables actions impossible by simple trust (similarity 0.86)
• System trust resists individual disappointments, unlike personal trust. (similarity 0.85)
• System trust operates independently of individuals’ personal readiness to trust (similarity 0.85)
• Trust in experts is trust in impersonal systems, not in individuals (similarity 0.85)
• Openly negotiated interdependence undermines trust that existing systems breed silently (similarity 0.85)
• Trust rests on structural system guarantees that relieve individuals of risk assessment (similarity 0.84)
• Trust in persons and things sustains ontological security. (similarity 0.84)
• Modern trust is vested in abstract capacities, not individuals (similarity 0.84)

Broader Connections

• System trust operates independently of individuals’ personal readiness to trust #expands (0.65)
• System trust cannot supply the mutuality that personal trust provides #complicates (0.60) — Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, 272
• System trust rests on expectations that most won’t test the system #expands (0.60)
• Trust rests on structural system guarantees that relieve individuals of risk assessment #corroborates (0.55)
• System trust underwrites ontological security but yields no psychological reward #expands (0.55) — Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, 271
• Trust presupposes a structured environment supplied by the existence of other systems. #expands (0.50)