We all learned the dimensions of fairness – and the importance of it – in playground games. In Professor Eric Beinhocker's essay “Trust, Populism & Broken Contracts” for the Edelman Trust Institute’s annual publication, the Executive Director of the Institute for New Economic Thinking Oxford writes about how a perceived lack of fairness can lead to lower trust in institutions and leaders.

This essay builds on the research in the INET Oxford Working Paper: "Fair Social Contracts and the Foundations of Large-Scale Collaboration”.