SOAS Research Online

Abstract

By examining the phenomenon of trust crisis, this thesis explores the connotation of trust in the context of a Chinese hospital. It brings together major literatures on Chinese hospital governance, systems theory, power, and trust. Combining with first-hand data collected in a Chinese hospital, this thesis produces a well-grounded analysis of how trust functions as a medium in a complex environment. With Luhmann’s systems theory, the circularity of the arguments this thesis puts forward is explained and justified. The thesis contends that, when a communication is overloaded with complexity and disrupted, trust can compound with another medium, power, to continue mediating communication. The compound form of trust is second-hand trust, a power-induced trust. Throughout the thesis puts a special emphasis on meaning: an attention to the very ‘grain’ of the mediating activity of trust.