The fragile tenets of trust

Abstract

The fragile tenets of trust Year after year, surveys measuring the level of trust toward the main social institutions show predominantly negative data. Statistics from Ipsos (2019), Gallup (2020) and Edelman (2020) place governments, banks and multinational companies among the least trusted organizations, while the military, the scientific community and small entrepreneurs maintain their credibility. On the rare occasions when surveys take religious organizations into consideration, they accompany other institutions on the downward trend. For example, the study published by Edelman states that only 46% of the global population trusts religious leaders (Edelman 2020). Only politiciansat 42%scored less well, while businesspeople and even journalistsboth at 51%enjoyed greater support. In addition, research by the Pew Research Center (2018) asked those Europeans who were raised as Christians or in another faith, but had lost it, why they no longer believed. The fourth most cited reason was 'scandals involving religious institutions and leaders' (53%). On the other hand, figures published by the Catholic Church in 2019 show that globally it continues to grow in numbers, with more than 1.3 billion members (Annuarium Statisticum Ecclesiae 2020). Despite these overall growing numbers, in Europe, Pew Research (2018) indicates that those who claim to be regular church attendees amount to just 18% of the population. Even so, a further 46% claim to be Christians even though they are non-practicing, that is, they attend church just a few times a year. However, their faith is much more than just nominal. Europe remains predominantly Christian. As this editorial is being written in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, there is evidence (Sherwod and Levene 2020) that during this time of uncertainty, people have been looking to fill a spiritual void. Parallel to this paradox of apparent lack of trust, but a clinging to or positive desire for faith or at least spirituality, there are other forces at work that provide additional nuance. Klaus Schwab, of the World Economic Forum, was articulating these as long ago as 2010 (Schwab 2010), when reflecting on the world's first truly global crisis: the financial crash of 2008. They are still pertinent in 2020 as we face the first truly global health pandemic. Schwab argued that in the face of globalization, growing interdependence, increased complexity and the shifts in power from the North and West to the South and East, 'people' were feeling powerless to control their lives. Neither were there organizational or national systems of values or processes that could provide the answers. As a consequence, those with simple answers encapsulated in ideologies such as nationalism, fundamentalism, populism or indeed other forms of activism, could find resonance. Faced with these contradictionslack of trust, but a desire for trust; falling church attendance, but a desire for belief; increased complexity, but a search for simplicitywe cannot look away. We wanted to ask ourselves hard questions abou...

Trust, disinformation, and digital media: Perceptions and expectations about news in a polarized environment

“…Trust is a basic fact of social life (Luhmann, 1968), which represents an integral support for the members of a society (Hawley, 2012;Simmel, 1987). However, it is a fragile asset, since it entails risk and lack of certainty (Narbona;Pujol;Gregory, 2020), since, according to Han, "trust is only possible in a middle state between knowing and not knowing. Trust means: despite not knowing in relation to the other, building a positive relationship with it" (Han, 2016, p. 91).…”