From Ideal Type to Normal Type: Trust in Evolutionary Perspective

• In Event: 209 - Theory Section Roundtable Session (one-hour).
  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 10. Contemporary Theory

Abstract

Trust, as a dynamic social reality, should be examined within different types of society. Based on the various scholarly typologies of trust in literature, this paper distinguishes three “ideal types”(see: Weber, 1978) of trust which provide us with descriptions of trust. Still, to explain trust, we suggest using pure concepts or “normal types”(see: Tonnies, 1957). We turn to the trust in family and community to understand how trust in society, at large, evolves. We finally conclude that cross-national variations in trust should be attributed more to the macro-level social forces, such as family structure, neighborhood characteristics and sociopolitical environment.

Author

• Zhiming Wu, University of British Columbia