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Who Can You Trust?

Who Can You Trust?

How Technology Brought Us Together – and Why It Could Drive Us Apart

Summary

Nominated for the Business Book Awards 'Embracing Change' category

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If you can't trust those in charge, who can you trust?

From government to business, banks to media, trust in institutions is at an all-time low. Widespread corruption, elitism and economic disparity have led to a worldwide upsurge of anti-establishment movements. But this isn't the age of distrust - far from it.

In this revolutionary book, world-renowned trust expert Rachel Botsman reveals that we are at the tipping point of one of the biggest social transformations in human history. A new world order is emerging: we have lost faith in brands, leaders and systems, but millions of people every day rent their home to total strangers on AirBnB, exchange cryptocurrency online, or get in the car of an unknown Uber driver. This is the age of distributed trust; a paradigm shift driven by new technologies that are rewriting the rules of an all-too-human relationship.

If we are to benefit from this radical transformation, it is vital that we understand the new mechanics of how trust is built, managed, lost and repaired. In Who Can You Trust?, Botsman provides a detailed map of this uncharted landscape - and explores what's next for humanity.

Reviews

  • Beautifully-written . . . the thesis is completely compelling. This is an important book
    Andy Haldane, Chief Economist, Bank of England

About the author

Rachel Botsman

Rachel Botsman is a leading expert and author on trust in the modern world. As the first Trust Fellow at Oxford University's Saïd Business School, she aims to challenge and change the way people think about trust and related topics such as power, influence, truth and beliefs. She has been recognised as one of the world's 30 most influential management thinkers by Thinkers50, one of the Top 10 most influential voices in the UK on LinkedIn and honoured as a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum. Her work has been widely published in The Guardian, Financial Times, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Harvard Business Review, Wired and she is the host of the thought-provoking podcast 'Rachel Botsman's Trust Issues.'
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