Hermeneutics to read ‘confidence’ and ‘trust’ in rely, confidence and trust in the ISAs translation

ABSTRACT This study aimed to develop a hermeneutical proposal to read ‘confidence’ (“confianza”) and ‘trust’ (“confiar”) in rely, confidence, and trust in the International Standards on Auditing (ISAs) translation into Spanish, based on contrasting them with the scientific literature on auditing. The gap addressed by this proposal is the lack of criteria to interpret the ISAs translation of rely, confidence, and trust into Spanish, which leads to an inadequate reading of the standards, since these terms are translated into Spanish as ‘confianza’ and ‘confiar,’ a misleading terminological choice. Some keys are provided for a hermeneutical reading when dealing with the concepts ‘confidence’ and ‘trust’ in the ISAs, since they are used interchangeably. This article is a starting point for both researchers and auditors when interpreting the terms rely, confidence, and trust translated into Spanish. From the methodological field, in the first place, a search was made in the ISAs for three key concepts related to what is understood in Spanish by the concepts ‘confidence’ and ‘trust’: rely (reliance), confidence, and trust, specifically determining the place where the concepts were to try to grasp the general meaning of the text within the paragraph of the corresponding standard; second, a structured accounting literature review on the concepts rely, confidence, and trust was conducted in the scientific auditing publications. This study provides the following hermeneutical keys to read ‘confidence’ and ‘trust’ in rely, confidence, and trust in the ISAs translation: rely is more oriented to controls, confidence refers to the relationship between an auditor and the stakeholders, and trust is a threat to the auditor’s objectivity.