Skip to main content

Research Repository

Advanced Search

Many stones can form an arch, singly none: (Re-)establishing trust in charities

Hyndman, N.; Liguori, M.; McKillop, D.

Many stones can form an arch, singly none: (Re-)establishing trust in charities Thumbnail


Authors

N. Hyndman

D. McKillop



Abstract

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.

Citation

Hyndman, N., Liguori, M., & McKillop, D. (2021). Many stones can form an arch, singly none: (Re-)establishing trust in charities. Financial Accountability and Management, 37(4), 385-398. https://doi.org/10.1111/faam.12286

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date Dec 30, 2020
Online Publication Date Jan 15, 2021
Publication Date Oct 12, 2021
Deposit Date Oct 18, 2021
Publicly Available Date Mar 28, 2024
Journal Financial Accountability & Management
Print ISSN 0267-4424
Electronic ISSN 1468-0408
Publisher Wiley
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 37
Issue 4
Pages 385-398
DOI https://doi.org/10.1111/faam.12286
Public URL https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1229602

Files

Published Journal Article (168 Kb)
PDF

Publisher Licence URL
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Copyright Statement
© 2021 The Authors. Financial Accountability & Management published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd

This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.




You might also like



Downloadable Citations