Changes to Trust in a Digital Society. The Case of a Full-Automated Danish Property Assessment

Beskrivelse

Increasing digitalization of modern societies raises the question how digital technologies influence relations of trust. In the research project, ”The Digital Society and Trust” funded by the Velux Foundation, we approach this as a partly empirical, partly conceptual question. Conceptually we define trust as a social phenomenon with characteristic traits. Firstly, trust unfolds between humans but is anchored within the individuals who encounter each other with either trust or distrust. The individual’s attitude of trust or distrust is, on the one hand, connected to her assessment of the other’s trustworthiness. On the other hand, it is also influenced by the individual’s prior experiences (for example betrayals of trust) and future goals (for example whether these goals are dependent on collaboration with the other). Secondly, even though interpersonal trust relations are central to the phenomenon of trust, there are other and perhaps just as important trust relations such as institutional trust, trust in oneself and trust in technology. Both interpersonal and institutional trust are characterized by reciprocity – thriving interpersonal and institutional trust are characterized by mutual assessments of trustworthiness. When I trust myself, I deem myself trustworthy (meaning that I can trust my own judgments and actions). Trust in technology is different in the sense that there is no reciprocity – we place trust in the technology but as technology is non-agential it does not reciprocate our trust. This has led many to argue that we do not trust but simply rely on technology. Regardless of the distinction between trust and reliance it is an empirical fact that the three other trust relations (interpersonal, institutional and self) are influenced by digital technologies. I will exemplify this with a specific case – the introduction of fully automated property assessments by the Danish tax authorities in 2023. The digital property assessment was invented as a response to a prior system and with the explicit ambition to create trust in the system of property taxation. Besides exceeding the budget 10 times, being 10 years behind schedule and as until now not completely implemented, the system has also been sending erroneous assessments out to the citizens. Thus the rebuilding of trust promised by the system has not been cashed in and its difficulties open questions of citizens’ trust and reliance on the tax authorities as well as decision makers’ trust in digital systems as solutions to modern administration.

Periode	23 maj 2025
Sted for afholdelse	Norges teknisk-naturvitenskapelige universitet, Norge
Grad af anerkendelse	International