Review

Author(s): Bernard Barber

Review by: Bernard Barber
Source: Contemporary Sociology, Vol. 21, No. 3 (May, 1992), pp. 401-402
Published by: American Sociological Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2076328
Accessed: 26-01-2016 05:18 UTC

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detachmentand human care. Whethermedi-
cal school teachers can counterthe retreatto
indifferencewith an effectivereminderof the
pastoral obligationsof being a physicianmay
finallybe more importantfor the profession
thanany workingout of the dismal science of
resource allocation.
Trust: Making and Breaking Cooperative
Relations, edited by Diego Gambetta. Ox-
ford: Basil Blackwell, 1988. 246 pp. $38.95
cloth. $17.95 paper. ISBN: 0-631-17587-3.
BERNARD BARBER
Columbia University
"Trust" is one of those social phenomenathat
we all have some commonsenseapprehension
of but thatare stillbadly in need of theoretical
specificationand systematicempirical study
guided by such theory. Although trust is
discussed in social science at least as farback
as Hobbes, though only briefly,it has not
been a main focus of any kind of systematic
sociological work. Strikingly,none of the
modem "classical" theorists-Marx, Weber,
Simmel, Durkheim, Parsons-has given it
any direct or intensive treatment.Recently,
however, there has been a stirringof such
sociological attention,primarilytheoreticalin
the case of Niklas Luhmann (1979) and
theoretical and empirical in the cases of
Garfinkel(1963) and Barber (1983).
Now comes another volume directly and
systematicallyconcernedwithtrust.Edited by
Diego Gambetta, of King's College, Cam-
bridge, it consists of essays by an exception-
ally able interdisciplinaryset of authors
chosen by the editor to participate in a
continuingseminar at King's College and to
preparepapers. The editorchose mainlyfrom
among his immediate colleagues: nine are
fromCambridgeUniversity,but two are from
theUnited States and Niklas Luhmannis from
Germany. The authors come from such
differentfieldsas philosophy,ethology,social
psychology,economics, political theory,soci-
ology, history,and social anthropology.Their
essays are oftenmixed theoreticaland empir-
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REVIEWS 401
ical efforts.The empirical areas covered are
as diverse as the scholarly specialties: India
and South Korea, eighteenth-century Naples,
the Islamic world, the Soviet Union, the
Mafia in southernItaly, Ghana, and French
engineeringfirmsin the Lyons area.
The editor, who is described on the jacket
as having an interestin "the theoryand the
empirical analysis of individual decision
mechanisms," tells us that he organized the
seminar and chose its members to help him
understand his present interest, the persis-
tence of the Mafia in southernItaly and the
resultinglack of the kind of cooperation and
trustnecessaryforsuccessfuleconomic devel-
opment. Both his past and present interests
seem to have determined the kinds of
colleagues Gambetta asked to help him.
Despite a sociological analysis by Luhmann,
theessays show a predominanceof economic,
individualistic, logical, and psychological
theory.As a result,thereis a heavy emphasis
on such concepts, terms,and notionsas game
theory,decision theory,probabilisticexpecta-
tions, uncertainty, risk, rationality,and inter-
ests. The preferencefor economic analysis is
further revealed in the assertionthattrustis to
be thoughtof as a scarce resource and in the
attentionpaid primarilyto cooperation and
trust in business and economic contexts.
There is no mentionof the familyor much of
political and social institutions. Although
several authorsmodestlystatetheirawareness
of the limitsof theiranalyses and express the
feeling that something is missing, they are
still bound by their theoretical preconcep-
tions. ApartfromLuhmann's good effort,the
sociological approach is not much in evi-
dence. (And pace Luhmann [p. 95], I too am
a functionaliston trust. How could I be
anythingelse?)
A sociologist would have told Gambetta
that he needs to pay more attention to
institutionsthan to individuals in his concern
for retarded economic development. The
sociologist would have said somethingabout
established and crescive moral rules. He
would have pointed to the necessary interac-
tion between trustand other control mecha-
nisms such as law, auditing,and monitoring.
He would not have disdained the significance
of individual interests,but he would have
shown how theyare structuredto a consider-
able extent by the environing institutional
402 REVIEWS
norms. He mighthave spoken of what I have
called "rationaldistrust"and suggestedthatit
is importantto know not just about expecta-
tions in general but about expectations for
technicallycompetentperformanceand fidu-
ciary responsibility. In general, he would
have said, "Too much rationalchoice theory,
not enough social systemtheory."
Sociologists who want to be stimulatedand
challenged by this able but limited set of
essays on trust will find this book worth
reading. We have not said the last word
ourselves and confrontingthe limitationsof
othersmay help us to do better.
Macro-Micro Linkages in Sociology, edited
by Joan Huber. Newbury Park, CA: Sage,
1991. 298 pp. $49.95 cloth. ISBN: 0-8039-
4103-X. $24.00 paper. ISBN: 0-8039-
4104-8.
DAVID HALLE
SUNY, StonyBrook and Universityof Califor-
nia, Los Angeles
This book consists of seventeenessays, each
by a differentauthor, plus commentariesby
two more authors.All the pieces are based on
papers given at plenary or thematicsessions
of the 1989 ASA meetings. All are interest-
ing, and many are outstanding. Since the
topic of "macro-micro" linkages is of such
centralinterestto the discipline, it is hard to
imagine any sociologist who will not find
rewardingmaterialhere.
I have grouped these papers by how much
they prefer (or at least use) collective and
large-scale forces in theirexplanationsrather
than individuals or small groups. (This is
differentfrom Huber's grouping.) At one
extreme is Randall Collins, who argues that
changes in gender stratificationare almost
always driven by macrolevel forces such as
the level of political mobilization, because
"empirical micro research overwhelmingly
documents the conservatism of face-to-face
interaction"(p. 111).
Next comes a group of papers that
document the effects of macro forces on
micro situations(withoutnecessarilygoing so
far as to insist that the main direction of
causation is always macro to micro). In this
group is Huber's paper (her presidential
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address) which, in a historicaltour de force,
tracesthe impactof ecological conditionsand
subsistencetechnologieson gender stratifica-
tion in preindustrialsocieties, and the impact
of such macro forces as mass education,
economic growth,and artificialfeedingtech-
niques on gender stratificationin industrial
societies. Alan Kerckhoff'sessay argues that
schools definitelyincrease prior inequalities
in academic performance,and perhaps in-
crease social class inequalities, when prior
academic inequalities are controlled for.
Barbara Reskin (drawingon researchwithPat
Roos) documentsthe fourteenformerlymale
occupations into which women in the 1970s
made dramatic inroads and sketches an
explanation for why inroads were made into
these rather than other occupations. Sara
McLanahan stresses the relation between
women's increased personal income and their
decreased willingness to remain marriedand
thendiscusses how children's interestscan be
protected in this new situation. Timothy
Smeeding argues that many of the feared
economic and demographic consequences of
aging societies will not materialize,since the
elderly in the twenty-firstcentury United
States are likely to be healthierand wealthier
than today's elderly (however, Smeeding
foresees problems if the education system is
not improved). William Wilson gives a
synopsis of his argument in The Truly
Disadvantaged. Marta Tienda provides an
excellent discussion of the kind of evidence
requiredto validate Wilson's thesis about the
existence of neighborhoodeffectson poverty
outcomes.
The next group of papers is concerned to
show how links can be made between macro
and micro levels. William Mason discusses
the ability of the multilevel perspective to
answer many of the criticisms aimed by
people such as Charles Tilly and David
Freedman against aspects of quantitative
research. Craig Calhoun contributesto our
understandingof social movementsby argu-
ing that many of the studentsin Tiananmen
Square took the riskstheydid neitherbecause
of instrumentalnor because of irrational
motives (at least as these terms are usually
understood)but because not to do so would
have imperiled their sense of self. Paul
DiMaggio argues very interestinglythat a
particularkind of role theory (that stresses