It's a Battle You Can't Win

Domination and Class Differences in Real-World Trust among Black Families

Bibliographic Data

ID4904532
AuthorsKarolyn Tyson (0009-0009-5164-5718, Georgetown University, corresponding author)
Year2024
Volume89
Issue5
Pages937-969
Publication date2024-10-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueAmerican Sociological Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0003-1224 • E-ISSN: 1939-8271
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/00031224241278355
OpenAlexW4402554708
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited76

How does class affect one's propensity to trust? Previous research finds higher-status actors express less trust than lower-status actors in interpersonal and institutional contexts. Scholars explain this finding as an outcome of structural dependence-when people have few alternative means for accessing valuable resources. In contrast, I find dependence inadequate to explain the relationship I observe between class and institutional trust among black families whose children were recommended for special education and other remedial program placement in an affluent, predominantly white school district. Drawing on retrospective interviews from a community ethnography, findings show that real-world trust decision processes also involve domination. Empirical studies of trust have overlooked the ways trustees-those being given trust-exercise power to achieve deference in trust exchanges, and how trustors-those placing trust in others-deploy their power to withstand trustees' influence. I argue that trust might best be conceptualized as a two-part decision process, because class and other status resources affect trustors' freedom to choose at two key junctures: (1) in weighing options and costs of trust errors, and (2) in communicating distrust in face-to-face interactions, where the potential for domination is high. Focusing on intersecting systems of power in authentic trust exchanges, this study shows how middle-class black trustors use symbolic resources to "go up against" the institutional power of educational experts and refuse placement, whereas working-class trustors consent to placement

Battle · Class (philosophy · Demographic economics · Economics · Geography · Political science · Sociology · World class · Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science · Demography · Engineering · Parental Involvement in Education · Social Capital and Networks · Urban, Neighborhood, and Segregation Studies

Tools

Open DOI