The Boundaries of Trust in a New Era

Abstract

This special topic forum examines the implications of contemporary societal and technological change for theory on trust. We briefly review these articles and identify two core themes emerging from the articles. The first theme focuses on the importance of agency to the formation and maintenance of trust, whereas the second theme addresses the relevance of vulnerability to the trust process. We argue that these themes are relevant due to three trends in organizations and society: (1) the impact of interdependence within and between organizations and between humans and technology on accountability; (2) the impact of high levels of global uncertainty on how, and to what extent, trust develops; and (3) the impact of advances in information technology on the willingness and ability to make informed decisions to trust. Implications for these trends on pushing the boundaries of trust theory are discussed.