Social networks of trust based on social values: An explanation of curvilinear relationships between generalized trust and democracy

ABSTRACT

Analyses of data from the World Values Survey show that generalized trust in highly democratic societies is stable and strong, but it is also strong in highly authoritarian societies. The goal of this study is to specify the mechanism of the relationship between generalized trust and political institutions. I categorize generalized trust as two types: democratic trust and authoritarian trust. When a society features a mixture of democratic and authoritarian trust, generalized trust tends to be weaker because of conflicts between democratic and authoritarian values. As a result, with diffusing democratic values, generalized trust in a society will first be temporally weakened, but eventually it will strengthen.

KEYWORDS:

• generalized trust
• social capital
• democracy
• authoritarianism
• borderland
• democratization

Acknowledgments

Parts of the earlier idea of this study were presented in XVIII ISA (International Sociological Association) World Congress of Sociology and 8th INAS (International Network of Analytical Sociologists) Conference. I would like to thank the audience. Their comments on the earlier idea of this study strongly improved my article. And, I would like to thank the anonymous reviewers of Journal of Mathematical Sociology for their helpful and constructive comments.

Funding

Funding for this project was provided by the Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research of Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JP16H02045, JP25000001, and JP15H01969).

Notes

¹ According to Glanville and Paxton (2007), experiences with different groups of people in localized settings cause generalized trust to grow. This seems to mean that social trust based on democratic values is more deeply related with generalized trust, compared with social trust based on authoritarian values.

² The relationship between diversity and social capital might be highly complex. For example, Ariely (2014) insisted that diversity has no negative relation with interpersonal trust, but a negative relation with belonging and social solidarity. Moreover, Bjørnskov (2008) said that political diversity has a negative effect on social trust, but ethnic diversity does not. In addition, Gundelach and Traunmüller (2014) alleged that cultural diversity does not impair norm reciprocity, even though cultural diversity and social trust have a negative relationship.

³ Beyerlein and Hipp (2005) pointed out different functions of bonding and bridging social capital. They insisted that bonding social capital has a negative effect on crime rates, but bridging social capital has a positive effect on them. According to their terms, we can look at generalized trust based on authoritarian values as bonding social capital, and generalized trust based on democratic values as bridging social capital. In this sense, too, it can be said that generalized trust based on democratic values produces a better educated, healthier, and wealthier society.

⁴ With regard to association, Schofer and Longhofer (2011) clarified that political factors are associated with levels of association in a society, as well as economic and educational factors. It can be said that this is supporting evidence of this view’s falsity.

Additional information

Funding

Funding for this project was provided by the Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research of Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JP16H02045, JP25000001, and JP15H01969).