ABSTRACT

TRUST: A SOCIOLOGICAL ANALYSIS

From a sociological perspective, the trust placed in others varies according to individual or situational variables, the knowledge developed by the individual, the cognitive process followed by him, the nature of the projected relationship, status, power relations within the social network, and social representations. Trust is a basis for building groups, with the role of reducing the complexity of social relations, substantiating decisions, actions and behaviors (Schmitz & Eckert, 2022).

From the analysis of the results of the opinion polls conducted on this subject, we find that a constant of the last three decades is a crisis of trust, visible in the way Romanian subjects relate to the Other, to the authorities, political systems and institutions, especially in moments with strong social and emotional load (such as the Covid-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine). In Romania, the levels of mistrust measured by the polls conducted by IRES, INSCOP, IPSOS, CURS and LARICS, in recent years, have varied according to electoral periods, media campaigns and economic changes and have generated either waves of solidarity and social activism or total passivity (Sztompka, 2003).

Developed on a background of growing pessimism of those surveyed, fueled by negative experiences in society, associated with phenomena on the public agenda and the media (corruption, nepotism), but also inherited from the communist period, the low level of trust today characterizes a large part of our contemporary society and constantly influences many dimensions and variables of their lives.

Keywords: trust, survey, post-communist Romania, crisis.

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