Donna L. Bahry
Department of Political Science
Penn State University
dbahry@psu.edu

Mikhail Kosolopov
Senior Scientist
Institute of Sociology, Russian Academy of Sciences
Krzhizhanovskogo 24/35 k. 1
Moscow, Russia

Polina Kozyreva
Senior Scientist
Institute of Sociology, Russian Academy of Sciences
Krzhizhanovskogo 24/35 k. 1
Moscow, Russia

Abstract

The willingness to trust strangers has been associated with a variety of public benefits, from greater civic-mindedness and more honest government to higher rates of economic growth, and more. But a growing body of research finds that such generalized trust is far more common in ethnically homogeneous than in more diverse societies. Ethnic difference is believed to breed more particularistic, ingroup ties, thus undermining both generalized and cross-ethnic trust. We argue that this image is too narrow, and we propose a broader model to identify the factors that give rise to cross-ethnic trust. Using data from two minority regions of Russia, we find considerable support for the model. We also find that high ingroup or particularistic trust is no barrier to faith in another ethnic group.

Support from the National Science Foundation (OPP 00-82715), the National Council for Eurasian and East European Research and the Russell Sage Foundation is gratefully acknowledged. Those entities are not responsible for the contents of this manuscript.