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PS236 Spring 2014
Yanjun LIU
Who Trusts? : Social Trust as an Undesirable Outcome in Contemporary China
Abstract: When is social trust a desirable outcome for democracy? A debate on the (un) desirability of social trust has emerged in recent literature with one side arguing for the bright side of social trust---favoring democracies in democratic contexts and another side arguing for the dark side of social trust----favoring nondemocracies in nondemocratic contexts. By asking who trusts and whether the most trusting individuals will be the vanguards of democratization, this research brings China into the debate and demonstrates with some quantitative evidence from a representative national sample that in China, higher levels of social
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I. Introduction
Social trust has long been recognized as builders of effective democratic governance or facilitators of transition to democracy. While most research has primarily been limited to democratic contexts, some recent research has expanded to nondemocratic contexts. In contrast to various mainstream theories of “good” social trust derived from democratic contexts, some recently emerging theories of “bad” social trust derived from nondemocratic contexts argue that social trust in nondemocratic countries may become stabilizers of incumbent autocratic or authoritarian regimes rather than promoters of democratization. This debate is still at its early stage given that most existing research has just extended to several nondemocratic countries.
This paper tries to join in this newly opened debate by expanding the research radar into the context of contemporary China. Specifically, this paper asks: who trusts in today’s China? Is social trust a desirable outcome for the prospect of democracy in China and why?
The rest of the paper is organized as follows: we will first survey the literature development on social trust from its bright side in conventional wisdom, to the sea change-triggering debate on its political institutional origins that brings context back in, to its dark side getting our attention in recent years. This will be followed by a brief review of a few existing research on social trust in China and the development of several testable
In this book, trust is defined as “one’s willingness to be vulnerable to another based on the confidence that the other is benevolent, honest, open, reliable, and competent.” (page xiii) The author recognizes that trust is complex and dynamic. She views trust as the “lubricant” that greases the machinery of the organization. Trust is particularly important where parties are interdependent, or the “interests of one party cannot be achieve without reliance upon another.” In schools “teachers and principals are
In the Berg, Dickhaut and McCabe (1995) study, factors that influence the likelihood of trust in economic transactions is a fundamental assumption that individuals act in their own self-interest which is often combined with other assumptions that (1) objects of interest are restricted to personal consumption;
The measurement that is unrelated to the trust is chance. Chance; for example, is an external locus of control measurement of a 24-item scale in relation to per se, a lottery win, or a person by chance getting into a vehicle accident. Hanna Levenson’s past measurement, “Differentiating among internality, powerful others, and chance” (1981), is a measurement to distinguish multiple dimensions within the external side of the Locus of Control continuum that contains the measures –3 = strongly disagree, –2 = disagree somewhat, –1 = slightly disagree, +1 = slightly agree, +2 = agree somewhat, +3 = strongly agree. Rather than rating people as simply external, the Levenson’s scale (1981) also investigates whether this externality is attributed to
The Model of Trust Enhancement was established to enhance and maintain the public’s trust in the accounting profession. Over the last two decades, the ethics of the accounting profession has been questioned and public trust destabilized, in particular for auditors, due to the Enron debacle. The fact that an auditing firm would assist their clients with publishing an inadequate set of financial statements shows their willingness to violate laws and regulations (Sims & Brinkmann, 2003). According to the textbook, “Because trust is essential, even the appearance of an accountant’s honesty and integrity is important. The auditor, therefore, must not only be trustworthy, but he or she must also appear trustworthy” (Duska, Duska & Ragatz, 2011, p. 116). The majority of statements filed inadequately have a substantial impact on the credibility of the accounting profession as a whole. Sullivan (n.d.10) states that a CPA must possess a high level of trust, by applying professional judgment and enhancing the three trustworthy characteristics (ability, benevolence, and integrity) when resolving accounting ethics dilemmas (slide 3).
Two very important values that affect American people every day is political trust and political efficacy. Political trust is when people entrust the government in making the right decisions for the country. Political efficacy, however, is when an ordinary person believes that they can make a difference and have a say in what the government does (We The People, p. 7-8, 2017). In 1958 the 73 percent of the American people believed that the federal government will do what is right most or some of the time. Today, political trust has declined drastically. In 2014,
Countries with basic history or society, then, ought to have comparable levels of trust in government. Economic reasons are by all account not the only driving powers of the decrease in trust around the world. Political and social parameters are additionally having an effect on everything. Continuous political embarrassments, wild debasement and the occasionally exaggerated center of the media on these issues have likewise contributed what's coming to them to the decay of trust in government foundations and political pioneers. Building political trust towards great administration, by definition, suggests the political-authenticity connection in the middle of trust and great administration. Authenticity exemplifies the assent that residents accord to the decision government and/or state
In the workforce, trust is most important thing because it help improve relations with are coworkers and prevent any big problems. In the 1950s, trust was very easy because simpler time of our generations. Whereas modern day, trust is a big problem because the influence of people that are around use and technology that use every day. The point is that society changes due to many changes in our lives and will continue to have trust problems in the future. Since the 1960s, figure 38 shown in the book bowling alone, that slowly trust has decline due to are younger Americans using more technology, less of face-to-face contact each other.
An important relationship exists between confidence in government and social trust which can be linked to public goods provision (Newton & Norris, Confidence in Public Institutions: Faith, Culture or Performance?, 1999). Social trust is broadly defined as trusting in others and can refer to both individuals and higher levels of analysis. Netwon & Norris found that social trust is not strongly associated with measure of public confidence at the individual level and personality types or cultural factors may be more significant at this level. However, at the national level there is a significant relationship between social trust and public confidence. The relationship is that social trust and high public confidence are highly
The concept of trust is an idea everyone toys with in their lives at one point. One may think that trust is based of moral values between a trusting relationship. But it can be more complex than many may think. Trust by definition is the “firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of someone or something”(1.). To many, it is the bases of a relationship. People trust one another because they teach one another or they love one another. Whatever the case, trust is an essential piece to a relationship. But it’s Implied that both parties don’t take advantage of that trust. This idea is discussed in literature such as in the novel Indian Horse. Throughout Saul’s Journey in the novel Indian Horse he learns about trust by experiencing it as reality then as an illusion and finally as a choice he must make.
In order for interpersonal trustworthiness to exist in organizations, a leader-follower relationship must first exist between the parties involved (Caldwell et al., 2010, p. 500). Once that leader-follower relationship is established, leaders have to earn trust. Leaders earn trust by their respective actions, morals and virtues. Trust is can also be based on past history. If something was done in the past which questions a leader’s values, morals or judgment, it would be unlikely that the leader would be trusted in the future. One of the most important parts of being an effective leader is building and maintaining trust. Trust can further be defined as a “multi-dimensional construct comprising different dimensions of the trustee’s attributes that the trustor evaluates” (Ingenhoff and Sommer, 2010, p. 341).
Having trust makes one fell safe and free of fear enough so that they can focus on other things.
At first these plans along with an extremely ingenious propaganda campaign stirred great optimism and productivity within the Chinese people, but as years went by the initial flare and excitement went out and few of these promises, reforms and goals had been reached. In some cases the promises were lies. The real actions of the Communist party showed quite a different picture than the lie of democracy that it was feeding the people. The new government never was a democratic one. As a matter of fact it was a dictatorship controlled by the China’s Communist Party (CCP). Throughout the years the communist government consistently and cruelly suppressed any attempts for the country’s democratization.
Building trust takes time and effort up front. It takes deep commitment and follow-through. It pays off.
According to Dettmer, Knackendoffel, & Thurston (2009), when we have trust, others are more likely to:
Trust in people is merely a relationship of reliance and an intrinsic part of human nature. It is established at the family level and expands outward as the child matures. Each being depends on their families to provide as one depends on educators to teach. Furthermore, trust is necessary for institutions such as schools, hospitals, businesses, and even the government to effectively operate. The workforce expects their employers to give a cash-able paycheck in return for their hard worked hours; consumers give a business compensation on the basis of receiving a product or service in return; and individuals put their