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Trustworthiness and Moral Character

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Abstract

Why are people trustworthy? I argue for two theses. First, we cannot explain many socially important forms of trustworthiness solely in terms of the instrumentally rational seeking of one’s interests, in response to external sanctions or rewards. A richer psychology is required. So, second, possession of moral character is a plausible explanation of some socially important instances when people are trustworthy. I defend this conclusion against the influential account of trust as ‘encapsulated interest’, given by Russell Hardin, on which most trustworthiness is explained by the interest of continuing relationship.

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Notes

  1. Sixteen volumes in the series are now in print. See <http://www.russellsage.org/research/trust/books>, accessed 16 February 2012.

  2. Hardin is distinctive among rational choice theorists in that he has extended the theory to explain trustworthiness. For other influential rational choice treatments of trust, see Dasgupta 1988; Coleman 1990; Williamson 1993.

  3. I am grateful to an anonymous reviewer for pressing these points.

  4. Simon Blackburn makes this point well; see his (2010: 106–107).

  5. Hardin notes something similar to this problem, but does not discuss any resolution; see (2002: 145–6).

  6. Diego Gambetta and Heather Hamill explore strategies that taxi-drivers use in assessing customers’ trustworthiness in their (2005) study (anticipated by Henslin 1968). They do not make the point that the practice challenges Hardin’s account.

  7. I take the point and adapt the example from Besser-Jones (2008: 323).

  8. The validity of Harman’s argument is not supposed to rest solely on these two experiments. They are intended to illustrate a point justified by a much larger body of research (Harman 2003: 87).

  9. For a similar attack, based on the same social psychological literature, see also Doris (2002).

  10. These points are not original to me. For argument that the evidence does not support the conclusion, see Montmarquet (2003); Sabini and Silver (2005); and Wielenberg (2006). Others have claimed that Harman attacks a straw man, and that some philosophical tweaking renders a less simplistic notion of character invulnerable to the critique; see Kupperman (2001) and Sreenivasan (2002). For a survey of the debate, see Upton (2009).

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Acknowledgments

The paper benefited from comments made after presentation at a seminar in Cambridge, especially from Hasok Chang, Sacha Golob and Chris Cowie. I am grateful to Alex Oliver, Simon Blackburn, Hallvard Lillehammer and two anonymous referees for comments and criticism. I am also grateful to Microsoft Research Cambridge, whose Studentship award provided financial support for the research.

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  1. Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, UK, CB2 1RH

    Thomas W. Simpson

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Simpson, T.W. Trustworthiness and Moral Character. Ethic Theory Moral Prac 16, 543–557 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10677-012-9373-4

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