How does trust and/or betrayal tie in with democracy and dictatorship/anarchy/empire?

Answer 1

Ahhhh. Ye olde, "How can we believe the government?" question.

I think your question is most applicable to the life and story of Rome and Julius Caeser. Caeser took emergency powers to become an effective emperor following the Senate's corruption and its refusal to admit the proper rights and sharing of information with its masses. When Caeser was assassinated though, the Republic was done for good and an Empire took reign with many shifts between anarchy and totalitarianism.

I don't know the specifics about Caeser's life, but I am familiar with the story and background of his since childhood friend Marcus Tullius Cicero (the same Cicero as the one in Shakespeare's play). Cicero (and many other Greco-Roman philosophers) felt that whe democracy takes hold, the masses induce extreme demands and become hypersensitive to satisfaction (i.e. the use of the Colluseum to settle the poor by giving them free bread and entertainment). He also felt that a Republic was the most stable form of government since it was known as being the most merit based system.

So really, the progression between your 4 mentioned conditions of state can occur along two main routes:

Democracy, Anarchy, Dictatorship, Empire.
Dictatorship, Anarchy, Democracy, Empire.

This progression usually ends with the Empire breaking down with a period of anarchy ensuing followed by multiple democracies and dictatorships taking its place (i.e. Roman, Islamic, Mongolian, Spanish, British, Soviet Empires). Trust and betrayal are just two mechanisms which are integrated into the nature of politics, a natural part of any form of government be it oppressive, negligent, organized or responsible. Anarchy even has some level of trust within it since emerging leadership is gathering the loyalty of its followers. Likewise, dictatorship has betrayal in that the dictator might become paranoid and betray his declared cause or his followers might rebel against him and start insurrections against the government.