Professor Mark Nichter

Event details

Lecture title: Towards an Anthropology of Trust in Risk Society: Reflections of a Medical Anthropologist

Date: 18 March 2010, 5.15pm

Venue: Faculty Room North, David Hume Tower, George Square, Edinburgh

Lecture abstract

Trust is a core dimension of all social relations, and the cement that hold together social institutions, yet it is not given the attention it is due in anthropology. Loss of trust in social institutions and longstanding relationships constitutes a form of structural violence that undermines the moral order and leads to states of collective anxiety.

In this talk I call for an anthropology of trust at this time of “Risk Society”, an anthropology that is equally concerned with factors fostering mistrust, and those promoting trust and resilience.

Following a brief introduction reviewing social theories of trust, I will turn my attention to contemporary challenges to trust drawing my examples from the health field. As a medical anthropologist, I will make a case for why trust is a key issue in both doctor: patient relations having real world ramification, and Global Health. Global health demands the interlinking of local, national and global information systems, and entails a loss of sovereignty in the name of Global Health Citizenship.

Trust in the health sector has been little studied in transnational settings and demands serious social science investigation at interpersonal, organizational and systems levels. Issues of trust loom large when one considers the dynamics of fostering international and intersectorial communication and cooperation among stakeholders having different levels of prestige and power.