Interdisciplinary Research on Trust and Trust-building in Societies

2014 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 25590118
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Sociology
• Research Institution: Komazawa University
• Principal Investigator: KATAOKA Emi 駒澤大学, 文学部, 教授 (00177388)
• Project Period (FY): 2013-04-01 – 2015-03-31
• Keywords: 信頼 / ソーシャル・キャピタル / 社会的公正 / 寛容性 / 外国人嫌い / 境界線 / グローバル化 / EU

Outline of Final Research Achievements

This research analyzed the characteristics of societies in which high mutual trust is maintained. Using the European Values Survey and other indexes, Kataoka found that the higher the social justice indexes, the higher the index of generalized trust, i.e., the percentage that answered “most people can be trusted.”Watanabe carried out a survey of socio-economic studies on trust. From the perspective of International Relations among countries and borders, Haba found that the essential issues for confidence-building are mutual trust, reconciliation, coexistence of diversities, construction of civil societies, and mutual exchange of young students. However, in the context of power shifts, xenophobia, territorial conflicts and antagonism are emerging. From a business strategy perspective, Inoue focuses on issues related to Japanese multinational companies (MNCs) building trust with local societies in different countries, especially in China and other Southeast Asian nations.

Free Research Field

社会学