ABSTRACT
The various ways in which trust plays a part in our everyday lives, in our relations with the state and in social and political theory are examined. This draws on a number of political debates in which trust has a meaningful role, leading to a summary of key definitions of trust located in the sociological and political-science literatures. These definitions are found to be inadequate, as they are one-directional (rather than reciprocal), essentialist and based upon self-interest. Rather than seek a ‘better’ definition for something that eludes definition, however, the chapter then builds a description – or re-description – of trust that is more pragmatic in character, drawing on what it is that people do or observe when they are said ‘to trust.’
