Reciprocity is an essential raw material of social capital, trust and cooperation.
To express it in the most general of terms I think it might look something like this –
Reciprocity (A) + Communication (B) = Trust (C) which in turn fosters Cooperation (D).
A+B = C = D
We wouldn’t need to bother with any of this if we were completely independent and didn’t need or want to associate with others. But whether we like it or not, everybody who lives on this planet is interconnected. There are no walls or borders capable of keeping us isolated and safe. Disease, economic ruin, even political unrest has a habit of getting past our most sophisticated defences.
The measures we take as we scrabble to insulate ourselves against outside influence are like chalk lines drawn on the floor by feuding siblings sharing a bedroom. It’s in all of our interests to learn how to live together and one of the ways we can learn to do this is to learn more about reciprocity and the elements that make it work.
“Regarding reciprocity and cooperation: each member of the body politic should live in the utmost comfort and welfare because each individual member of humanity is a member of the body politic and if one member of the members be in distress or be afflicted with some disease all the other members must necessarily suffer. For example, a member of the human organism is the eye. If the eye should be affected that affliction would affect the whole nervous system.” (1)
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