It is obvious that in our day-to-day lives, a lot hangs on trust, and thus on whether those around us are trustworthy. Yet there are several philosophical issues surrounding trust and trustworthiness. For example, is
trusting someone different from
relying on them? Correspondingly, is being
trustworthy different from being
reliable? Assuming that there is a difference, in what does the difference consist? What renders one
worthy of trust? Is our trustworthiness something under our control?
In
How to Be Trustworthy (Oxford University Press, 2019),
Katherine Hawley explores many of the central questions one might ask about trust and trustworthiness, proposing an account according to which being trustworthy is a matter of avoiding unfulfilled commitment.