The network of exchangers, not trust itself, is the enabling social capital.

Evidence

There might be some feedback between trust and further development of trust. I cooperate with you, discover your trustworthiness, and therefore cooperate even more or on even more important matters with you. If I trust most of the people with whom I interact, I might also begin to take the risk of cooperating with almost anyone I meet, at least if they are likely to remain in my ambit. Hence my general optimism about others is a benefit to those others when they might wish to cooperate with me (or even to abuse my optimistic expectations). Again, however, it is the high level of trustworthiness of people in my network that generates this benefit. Moreover, their trustworthiness is, on the encapsulated-interest account, the result of their having an interest in being trustworthy toward those with whom they have ongoing interactions that are beneficial and are likely to continue to be. Hence, again, it is the network of exchangers that is the social capital that enables us, not our trust. — Russell Hardin, Trust and Trustworthiness, 410

Categorization

• XREF: Directly builds on the reader’s core framing: the doctor’s wife in Saramago is one node in a network whose trustworthiness (not naked trust) is the operative social capital. Also connects to Hardin’s own earlier chapters.
• ADDENDUM: Supports the reader’s integration with Saramago: trust follows from observed trustworthiness within an ongoing exchange network, which is exactly why the wife’s sighted monitoring sustains order.