How Important Is The Concept Of Trust In Australian National Identity? And How Does The Actual Australian Experience Of Trust And Distrust, And Attitudes To Each Other And To Government, Fit Into The Theoretical And Historical Discussions Of These...
...that trust is central to the Australian national identity is that it has sparked a debate over traditional Australian ways to define themselves, questioning what would have been concrete aspects of being Australian, such as egalitarianism, the policy of ‘a fair go’ and the ever elusive, yet pervasive idea of ‘mateship’.
Firstly, we must define specifically what is meant by the word ‘trust’. One of the most influential theories on trust is the theory of “social capital”. Broadly, social capital refers to relationships between people or groups of people that have beneficial outcomes for one or more of the participants. The definitions and applications of social capital theory are varied because, as the term refers to all human interaction, it is highly context sensitive. Some of the major influential proponents of social capital theory are Francis Fukuyama , Robert Putnam and James Coleman . In spite of the morass of literature dealing with the subject the most concise definitions of social capital theory comes from the World Bank “Social capital is not just the sum of the institutions underpinning a society—it is the glue that holds them together.”
Secondly, we must discuss and identify what national identity is, and specifically how that relates to Australia. For our purposes, we will use the broadest and most accessible definition of national identity as Proposed by Ian McAllister “the feeling of being associated with a national group, defined by common heritage which may be based on many attributes, the most common being race, territory, language and history.” Of course, all Australians could identify themselves in a multitude of different ways (Asian-Australian, Indigenous, homosexual, Islamic, etc.), and not all of these methods relate in any way to a sense of national belonging, be it Australian or otherwise. However, this is not the place for a...
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