Institutionalized Distrust and Monitoring in Means‐Tested Benefits Programs

The dominant view in philosophy of trust is that trust and monitoring are opposed. I argue that not all forms of monitoring necessarily undermine trust, but that certain forms of it do because they signal distrust of those being monitored. Crucially, this type of signaling is not confined to interpersonal contexts. I defend the view that institutions can signal distrust and offer the concept of institutionalized distrust to describe a form of distrust that does not reside in individual attitudes, but is instead expressed through policies, practices, and procedures, including forms of monitoring that are intrusive or disproportionate. My primary example is the eligibility procedures of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in the United States. I show that food assistance recipients encounter distrust in their interactions with the institutions they rely on for support and whose distrust may, in turn, influence attitudes of distrust among the public.