The internet is trumping geography. As we live progressively more of our lives online, we interact with progressively more different people. It becomes progress

The internet is trumping geography. As we live progressively more of our lives online, we interact with progressively more different people. It becomes progressively less important how much trust we have for our meatspace neighbors. Most of us have had oodles of conversations and economic transactions with people on other continents while the people next door remain strangers. With all of that online interacting, global interpersonal trust may rise, but won't approach Danish levels in our lifetimes. We cannot base our social systems on trust. But we can base them on transparency, which, eventually, builds trust.