Talcott Parsons was right in regarding the expressive solidarity of the small group as the basis of political trust precisely in relation to the unavoidable indeterminacy of complex political processes. The same circumstance points to the fact that subsystems of society such as the political, and perhaps the economic system, which are not adequate for present-day requirements, remain dependent on other fields of action where the orientation to the present, required for the formation of trust, has been preserved.

DEFINE: Clarifies how expressive solidarity in small groups functions as the foundation of political trust.

Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, loc. 130