LEGITIMATE DISTRUST

In this nonfiction work, Saviano conducts a philosophical, sociological, and psychological exploration of how and why people have lost trust in the institutions that govern their lives.

In Book II of his “Collapse of Trust” series, the author begins by asserting that “public discussions of conspiracy belief often begin from a diagnosis of irrationality.” In other words, the usual premise is that people who develop conspiracy theories are operating from misinformation, “an error in reasoning,” or some other defect in judgment. “This book,” Saviano declares, “begins from a different premise. It asks what conditions make distrust reasonable.” The author examines the issue from the perspective of institutional fault. What are institutions (governmental, financial, industrial) doing—or not doing—to cause people to lose trust in them? Distrust, the author argues, begins with feelings of unease, the sense that information or answers to questions are incomplete. This unease grows into suspicion, creating a cognitive disturbance and feelings of betrayal. “Conspiracy theories,” Saviano posits, “reduce that discomfort by offering internally coherent stories that close explanatory gaps.” The problem is not limited to the United States; in addition to examples of domestic institutional betrayals that led to valid conspiracy allegations (such as the Tuskegee syphilis study conducted by the U.S. Public Health Service from 1932 to 1972), the author provides case studies from Brazil, India, Russia, and Europe. This academic treatise is composed in a scholarly fashion, employing the language of the social sciences. Although Saviano provides introductory definitions for the terminology he uses, lay readers are likely to find the prose unnecessarily lengthy and cumbersome—too many sentences run for half a paragraph, and a bit of judicious cutting for the sake of brevity would make the work more accessible to a broader readership. Still, the subject matter is compelling and certainly timely, and the book has several engaging chapters, such as one on how to differentiate “between legitimate skepticism and harmful paranoia.” The work closes with a cautiously optimistic conclusion: “The alternative to trust is not chaos. It is disciplined coexistence under uncertainty.”

A challenging, relevant, and thoughtful read.