Trust: A History

15 October 2014
We often talk of a 'crisis of trust' - justifiably so, as the current crisis in the Western world is serious. However, trust as such is often misunderstood because we are unable to place it in historical context. 

We often talk of a 'crisis of trust'. Justifiably so, as the current crisis in the Western world is serious, but it is often misunderstood because we are unable to place it in historical context. As a result, our policy-makers talk a lot about trust, but continue in practice to undermine it. In this event to mark the publication of his most recent book Trust: A History (Oxford University Press, 2014), Prof Geoffrey Hosking (UCL SSEES)  will argue that trust is often unconscious: time, place and social context are crucial to our routine assumptions about it. It is part of a web of interdependence on which we rely to conduct our social lives. These webs differ greatly from one society to another, and from one epoch to another. Trust is mediated through symbolic systems, such as religion and money, and the institutions associated with them, such as churches and banks. Historians today, well versed in cultural and social history, are excellently equipped with the tools we need to study the varying webs of trust, but first we need to study trust itself systematically as a part of social structure.

Please email Sarah-Jane Gregori by 3 October 2014 if you wish to attend.