Trust is the foundation of social order & a fairer society

Authors: Professor Krishnamurthy Sriramesh, University of Colorado, USA, Professor Dejan Vercic, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia and Professor Ana Tkalac Vercic, University of Zagreb, Croatia.

At the micro level, interpersonal trust – the tapestry that holds a society together – also permeates organisations, leading to organisational trust (the meso level). Both of these then help establish a strong society (the macro level). Trust is also fundamental to social order facilitating healthy relationships, transactions, and exchanges all leading to a fairer society.

It is an understatement to say that today we live in revolutionary times of accelerated change. Globalisation, a hallmark of the 21st century, has contributed significantly to a changing world order aided in no small measure by digitalisation brought on by Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) and social media. Whereas some of the changes have been for good, several have brought confusion, disorientation, and anxiety to global citizens who seem to trust social institutions less and less. Among other things, this anxiety is eroding trust in social institutions, interpersonal trust, and perhaps even individuals' trust in themselves. Economic challenges and political conflicts have highlighted how quality and quantity of life may be determined more by where one is born and lives than how good the person is as a human being – contributing to mass migration, especially in the past decade.

So-called 'fake news' and conspiracy theories are plentiful, often going viral via digital media that offer almost unfettered access to intentional disinformation campaigns – campaign often instigated by elected individuals. There appears to be increasing support for authoritarian leaders who promise to protect citizens against a 'disruptive future', essentially arguing against social change by offering their own conspiracy theories. In July 2020, The Washington Post’s fact checking revealed that then US president Donald Trump had uttered more than 20,000 false and misleading claims during his first term! It is no wonder that trust in governments seems to fall further with each passing year. Corporations are not faring much better, even in an era when Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is a popular concept. Non-profits and civil society may be perceived as trustworthy and contributing to a fairer society but not by a significant margin over the other two types of organisations.

In this climate of growing distrust, professional communicators (including public relations and strategic communication) have a critical role to play. They have both contributed to, and resisted, the new information and communication order that is emerging in the 21st century, which is controlled by a handful of US tech companies - the MMAAAGs (Meta, Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, Google). These actors have strategically used Artificial
 
Intelligence to gain a uniquely powerful role mirroring the control that the Seven Sisters group of major oil companies had on the world from the 1940 to 1970s.

• Professors Sriramesh, Vercic and Vercic are guest editors on a Special Issue of Corporate Communications: An International Journal, which explores the role of professional communicators in issues of trust and reputation. Explore the table of contents.
• The Special Issue includes selected papers from the 26th International Public Relations Research Symposium, held in Lake Bled, Slovenia. Abstracts of all papers presented at the conference are free to access.