Organizational Antecedents of Trust in Producer-Owned Firms

We examine how organizational characteristics of producer-owned firms affect the level of perceived trust among cooperative members, using survey data from a sample of U.S. agricultural cooperatives. Our results indicate trust is correlated with property right and organizational structures previously identified in the literature as significant for cooperative performance. We find that the norm of equality and the homogeneity of member interests are key antecedents of organizational trust in producer-owned firms. We also find that some property right structures that improve organizational trust are counterproductive for member investment incentives.