In the present paper we explore the minister / political adviser relationship in Greece by addressing the issue of trust. While much has been said on the relationship between advisers and the civil service, our knowledge of the adviser-minister interface is rather limited. Very little is known on the issue of trust, which is the real currency in that relationship. Trust buys influence with the minister. For this reason it begs for more scholarly attention. The paper is driven by a set of questions. How can trust be defined in the ministerial cabinet context and what are its sources? Do minister-principals, trust their adviser-agents the same or are there different circles of trust within cabinets, which ones and why? In the end, how much currency does trust have in the policy making process? Is it always a source of influence and when does it backfire? In order to answer those questions we use data from interviews with political advisers in Greece N= 28 in the period 2010-2013 and N=13 in 2016.
