When trust is low, risk is high and vice versa (Ekberg 356). Giddens thinks trust takes the place of knowledge and offers security (Giddens and Pierson 108 Ekberg 356). Giddens states there are two kinds of trust: facework commitment or faceless commitment. Facework is a trust in in people due to low-time space relationships where people directly relate to each other directly many times in person, and this was the predominant mode of communication in pre and primary modernity. People in this communication shared a sense of community and belonging. Faceless communication occurs in post-traditional/reflexive modernity. It is a trust in society's symbols such as money, experts, science and tech. It is distant and is built upon "credentials and legitimacy conferred through professional codes of practice, qualifications, accreditation, licensing, performance and reputation (Giddens, 1990: 87)" (Ekberg 356). This increasing trust in the experts has not made us feel better though, and it "has produced its opposite in anxiety and doubt" (Ekberg 357). This is increased by the disagreements in science which has called into question the pedestal science used to be on" (Ekberg 357 and Giddens 1996 42).
References:
Ekberg, Merryn. "The Parameters of the Risk Society: A Review and Exploration." Current Sociology 55: 343-366. Web. 21 July 2014.
Giddens, Anthony. The Consequences of Modernity. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1990.
Giddens, Anthony. In Defense of Sociology: Essays Interpretaions, and Rejoinders. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1996.
Giddens, Anthony and Christopher Pierson. Conversations with Anthony Giddens: Making Sense of Modernity. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1998.