India's Trust Gap

If you are a cricket fan of my age, Cricket World Cup 2019 would be fresh in your memories, more so than 2023 maybe. We started off pretty poorly, then stabilized with Dhoni and Jadeja batting carefully. It was then that Jadeja teed off, while Dhoni continued cautiously, providing the balance to the team score. Despite their efforts, we fell short. 

A significant section of Indian fans blamed Dhoni for the defeat. This, despite KL Rahul, Kohli, and Rohit scoring just one run each, Dinesh Karthik managing six, and Hardik Pandya and Rishabh Pant adding 32 each. Dhoni’s 50 off 72 balls and Jadeja’s 77 had given India a fighting chance. In a team game, blaming a single player is irrational—but even more so when that player contributed significantly to the recovery.

This isn't an isolated case. The middle class is lambasted by many scholars for not taking the baton of reforms ahead in India. However, it is the same group which forms the majority of the honest tax payers who receive no appreciation. On the contrary, those engaged in theatrics of voicing the concerns, over real substance, are all over the place. 

At the heart of this paradox is a poor understanding of negative, zero, and positive impact.

In any situation, you can either contribute positively, negatively or don't contribute at all. In real life, you will observe, those who make partial positive contribution, are criticized more than those with negative and zero contribution. The world doesn't really like those I call the practical heroes. It revers the braves who are able to cross the final boundary or help the collective do the same, but it absolutely loathes those who attempt the same, but aren't able to cross that final line. 

The question is why? Perhaps because we live in a low trust society. We don't trust the motives of practical heroes. They are assumed to have selfish intentions like personal milestones, hidden benefits to self amongst others. It is only when they are able to cross the final hurdle and deliver the outcome, that they are able to break the shackles of these assumptions tied to all of us by default. 

India, it appears, is a low trust society. The high trust groups India had historically viz. family, muhallas, pols, purams, caste (while totally acknowledging the inequalities and discrimination associated with these groups), have given way to modern groups like corporate companies, registered trusts, elected governments, selected officials etc. These new associations are bound by agreements, more formal than informal, but without the necessary enforcement mechanisms. This has resulted in a situation where the default assumption is that people will cheat than being civil. 

Consequently, we have monitoring mechanisms. We have a plethora of middle level managers whose sole job is to ensure others do their job. We prepare reports and consolidated report of reports. Each level of hierarchy reduces the deadline by few days so that work will get done at least by the deadline they have been assigned. We have a team lead being reviewed by the manager who in turn reports to the Vice President and so on. We have multiple layers of administrative boundaries, Centre - State - Divisions - Districts - Blocks - Village - Habitation and at each level of hierarchy, we have multiple reviewing authorities. This is the level of trust in the modern organizations.

Compare this with the concept of arrange marriage. Sons and daughters are married off to a total stranger solely on the basis of familial/caste/regional ties and the strong bonds of community which these groups have. The contradiction is hard to miss. 

Another corollary of this low trust is our over-emphasis on the principle that Justice must not just be done, it must be seen to be done. We want to gain trust of the people in the modern organizations. This results in situations where high profile cases are fast tracked, while millions languish in hopes of justice, despite this being of overall less utility to the society. We end up focusing disproportionately on the  individual case/situation than generating systemic solutions to the problems. 

This is a vicious cycle. Low trust feeds on itself. People try to cut corners, find ways to get ahead in the long queue rather than asking for decongestion for all. This further promotes low trust in the "system", and the cycle continues!

The way out lies in building civic trust—a significant departure from our cultural conditioning. Consider the Prisoner’s Dilemma. When individuals prioritize personal gain over collective good, the outcome is worse for everyone. If, instead, we cooperate and assume others will act in good faith, we all benefit.

Of course, it is easier said than done. But, this is the cat that must be belled—by all of us; only then can we channel our energy on better things.