Trust in charities is critical in terms of the health of the sector, and also in relation to the establishment and maintenance of social cohesiveness. Moreover, lack of trust can not only damage the charity sector (having negative impacts on public perceptions and donor giving) but can also undermine attempts at building social capital. Yet, how trust is defined, the various forms that it takes and how it is established (or re-established, if lost) is unclear. This paper explores the various conceptions of what trust is, applies them to charities and examines trust in relation to the sustainability of the sector. A key finding is that trust has many dimensions, and charities (and the sector as a whole) need to work on a range of fronts on an ongoing basis to protect and build perceptions of trustworthiness (‘many stones can form an arch’). As a consequence, the paper presents an outline research agenda (in the form of four key questions) that encourages future researchers to enhance understanding of the important interplay between trust and charities more fully. This focuses on the relationship between charities and beneficiaries, how trust-building activities vary with charity size/area of activity, the potential role of communicating service delivery and what ‘good regulation’ might look like.

中文翻译：

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许多石头可以形成一个拱形，一个没有：（重新）建立对慈善机构的信任

对慈善机构的信任对于该部门的健康以及建立和维护社会凝聚力至关重要。此外，缺乏信任不仅会损害慈善部门（对公众认知和捐助者捐赠产生负面影响），还会破坏建立社会资本的努力。然而，信任是如何定义的，它采取的各种形式以及它是如何建立（或重新建立，如果丢失）尚不清楚。本文探讨了信任是什么的各种概念，将它们应用于慈善机构，并研究了与该部门可持续性相关的信任。一个关键发现是信任有很多方面，慈善机构（以及整个行业）需要在一系列方面持续开展工作，以保护和建立可信赖的观念（“许多石头可以形成一个拱门”）。因此，本文提出了一个大纲研究议程（以四个关键问题的形式），鼓励未来的研究人员更充分地了解信托与慈善机构之间的重要相互作用。这侧重于慈善机构与受益人之间的关系、建立信任的活动如何随慈善机构规模/活动领域的不同而变化、沟通服务交付的潜在作用以及“良好监管”可能是什么样子。