Other Law Commons^™

Trust Relationships: Introduction, Tamar Frankel

Faculty Scholarship

Law and trust interact. Law addresses trust among individuals and within institutions and societies. As Professor Miller demonstrates, law addresses physicians' trustworthiness, imposing constraints on many aspects of physicians' activities, including research and patients' care.' Professor Seligman highlights the impact of law on trust when legal status, which prevailed in the past, moved to the current contract freedom. Legal status provided established clear predictable roles, which inspired confidence. Contract allowed people to play multiple roles of their choice. The variety of roles reduced predictability and transformed historic confidence into relationships fraught with uncertainty, which he called trust.