Trust has a curious relationship with privacy. We need circles of trust or we won’t share; when something we thought was private becomes shared without permission it shatters trust.
I’m a bit double-minded about privacy.
I can see the dangers of governments and corporations exploiting their access to your information for power, control, and profit. This is an institutional extension of our flawed human nature. There are good reasons to make voting a private process, for example.
People conflate privacy and anonymity. Anonymity is hazardous – people say and do more terrible and hurtful things when they think no one knows who they are, or they will not be held accountable. We’re individually and collectively better when everyone must stand by their word and be accountable for our actions.
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Trust is priceless in the moment of testing. A wise man I know says that cynicism is a giant scab that protects you from disappointment. Many among us have been swimming in a sea of distrust so long that dark humor becomes normal.
Many have lost trust in institutions. Banks failed or didn’t keep their promises to customers. Companies prioritized some shareholders and abused their own employees. Public agencies lied to us then doubled down in cover-ups. Schools mismanaged a crisis or conflict. Churches tolerated and hid the abuse of the vulnerable.
Cynicism is understandable as a defense mechanism. It’s a powerful shield against almost everything.
But you can’t be cynical and hopeful at the same time. Hope can live beneath cynicism, quietly waiting. Hope is in precious short supply in most hearts.
Good leaders can tap into that hope underneath the scab. Never abuse that hope; always handle hope with gentleness. Anyone who shares their hope is entrusting you, saying “Don’t ruin this.”
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Rebuilding trust in institutions begins by acknowledging mistakes, errors, lies, and manipulations. Hold some leaders accountable, and people who were their accessories. I speak of confession, not admission. (Admitting something is enough to get on talk shows; confession is meaningful.) The way up first requires going humbly down.
The next step is forgiveness. Relationships re-made on the far side of confession and forgiveness can be stronger and better. There are many examples of companies who disappointed customers, acknowledged this and made it right, creating long and loyal customers for the future. The same can happen with other institutions.
Take note of the history of cults, dictatorships, and collectivist ideologies – they have been incapable of openly acknowledging failures or fostering forgiveness.
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Trust is an epiphenomenon of relationships. Institutions are a larger fractal state of interpersonal interactions.
Corporations where invented as a legal construct – a ‘corpus’ (body) without a soul, that could interact much the way individuals do, but shielding individuals in the corpus (especially owners). Abstraction and anonymity are simultaneously the power and the problem.
Institutions aren’t uniformly “one person” in the same way that individuals have fragmented perspectives and motivations. There are subsets and sub-tribes holding different narratives. The lack of clarity about who you are interacting with complicates restoring trust in an institution.
Rebuilding trust in institutions is complex and requires faith in larger possibilities. It requires letting go of preferred grudges and hurts. Rebuilding trust in institutions is the work of deep men and women.
Perhaps this is your calling?
