The very conditions that create agency also preclude personalizing trust relationships.

Evidence

Granovetter is probably correct in observing that, when faced with the choice, individuals and organizations invariably opt to transact with those of known reputation or, better yet, with those with whom they have had past dealings (1985, p. 440). His use of examples, cited earlier, of the social ties that bind established firms and their members who are engaged in repetitive transactions or have ongoing relationships in the same community, industry, or labor market clearly illustrates this preference. But embedding agency in social relations is not always possible. Indeed, there is a systemic link between the sources of agency-particularly those bridging physical and social distance and facilitating collective actionand the absence of opportunities to personalize these relationships. — Shapiro, Susan P., The Social Control of Impersonal Trust, 40

Categorization

• QUESTION: A systemic link is asserted but only gestured at; this cycle between distance-driven agency and impersonal trust is worth tracing fully in the chapter onward.
• ADDENDUM: Relevant to ‘On Sacrifice’ and the broader social-control theme: when relationships cannot be personalized, societies reach for impersonal regulators (institutions, rituals) instead of kinship-based trust.
• XREF: connects to: Impersonal trust persists despite agency tensions and varies greatly across conditions. — Shapiro, Susan P., The Social Control of Impersonal Trust, 146; Agency relationships multiply because scale creates access barriers to information and property. — Shapiro, Susan P., The Social Control of Impersonal Trust, 23; Collective agency shifts trust from persons to future-dated impersonal systems — Shapiro, Susan P., The Social Control of Impersonal Trust, 29 (+5 more)

Related

• Impersonal trust persists despite agency tensions and varies greatly across conditions. (similarity 0.88)
• Agency relationships multiply because scale creates access barriers to information and property. (similarity 0.84)
• Impersonal trust emerges where face-to-face control mechanisms are unavailable (similarity 0.84)
• Collective agency shifts trust from persons to future-dated impersonal systems (similarity 0.82)
• Trusting agency relationships enables complex social organization. (similarity 0.82)
• Agency relationships drive social differentiation and bridge exchange distances (similarity 0.82)
• Impersonal trust emerges where principals lose direct power to regulate agents. (similarity 0.81)
• Trust expands the complexity a social system can sustain. (similarity 0.80)
• Personal trust fails where trust must cross corporate intermediaries. (similarity 0.80)
• Trust can arise even when transactions are not embedded in social relations. (similarity 0.80)
• Shifts from personal to impersonal relations track society’s size and complexity (similarity 0.80)
• Trust is structurally precarious because agents control symbolic wealth at a distance from principals. (similarity 0.80)
• Social relations are sufficient but not necessary conditions for trust in economic life. (similarity 0.79)
• Trust is structurally vulnerable because agents can exploit principals’ ignorance and distance. (similarity 0.79)

Broader Connections

• Collective agency shifts trust from persons to future-dated impersonal systems #complicates (0.80) — Shapiro, Susan P., The Social Control of Impersonal Trust, 29
• Trust grows out of the specific relationship between the parties #complicates (0.78)
• Social complexity forces the shift from personal to impersonal, system-governed trust. #complicates (0.78)
• Trustworthiness is grounded in the trusted’s interest in maintaining a relationship #complicates (0.75)
• Personal trust forms only where a personality is socially indispensable #corroborates (0.75)
• Trusting people cannot be switched on without relevant relational change. #qualifies (0.72)