It is a peculiar implication of the thesis that trust is inherently moral, and of much of the current literature on the need for trust in society, that distrust must evidently therefore be bad. But, distrust is sometimes the only credible implication of the evidence. Indeed, distrust is sometimes not merely a rational assessment but it is also benign, in that it protects against harms rather that causing them. For example, parents who do not entrust the safety of their children to unworthy caretakers, or international institutions that do not entrust the welfare of the Cambodian people to Pol Pot, are acting morally according to almost any conception of morality. Although one might argue that acting as though one trusted some person would be a moral, praiseworthy act in its own right (see Mansbridge 1999), it would surely not be in such cases. Because distrust is benign whenever it is justified, it seems implausible that trust is inherently a moral notion

DEFINE: Clarifies that distrust is not inherently opposed to morality — it is morally neutral or positive when justified.

Russell Hardin, Trust and Trustworthiness, loc. 430