infonet-economy

Stakeholder theory has addressed the role of trust in organization-stakeholder relationships in depth. Although it is similarly relevant, distrust as a distinct construct from (low) trust has received relatively little consideration by stakeholder theorists. Thus, this article focuses on stakeholder distrust and reflects on the findings of distrust research in organizational studies and the implications for stakeholder theory. For this purpose, we conduct a systematic literature review of organizational distrust research to develop tentative propositions about the antecedents and consequences of stakeholder distrust. Value incongruence, outgroup bias and malevolence portray three essential antecedents of distrust between stakeholders and organizations, whereas reduced value creation constitutes one major consequence of stakeholder distrust. With this contribution, we encourage other stakeholder theorists to expand the research and discussion on distrust in organization-stakeholder relationships.