Social Capital - Management Assignment

3.1. What is Social Capital?

There is a traditional consensus that there exists three distincs traditions that conceptualize and analyze social capital. All three would be relevant for our reasoning.

- Pierre Bourdieu bourdieu2: who conceptualised social capital as the ‘actual or potential resources’ that an individual has at his/her disposal as a result of ‘a durable network of more or less institutionalised relationships of mutual acquaintance and recognition’, i.e. membership in a group. Some authors point out that this definition must be viewed as part of his broader concern with developing the different types of capital in order to explain the means by which the social stratification system is preserved and the dominant class-reproduction strategy is legitimised.

- J.S. Coleman coleman defines it as the set of resources that inhere in family relations and in community social organisations and that are useful for the cognitive or social development of a child or young person. Social relations were viewed by Coleman to make up important ‘capital resources’ for individuals by means of processes such as setting ‘obligations, expectations and trustworthiness, creating channels for information, and setting norms backed by efficient sanctions’. These resources may be influenced by factors such as generalised trustworthiness which ensures that obligations are met, the extent to which a person is in need of help and differences among cultures as to whether aid should be requested or given.

- Robert Putnam putnam1, putnam2 and putnam3: Social capital refers to features of social organisation, such as trust, norms, and networks, that can improve the efficiency of society by facilitating co-ordinated action. Or rather,“Social capital” refers to features of social organisation such as networks, norms and social trust that facilitate coordination and cooperation for mutual benefit. Underpinning the concept is the notion that social networks encourage norms of reciprocity, ideally generalised rather than specific reciprocity. Whilst acknowledging that there are different forms of social capital (e.g. involving ‘multi-stranded networks’, formal organisation or ‘public-regarding purposes’), he argues that forms of social capital vary (more or less) along two key dimensions: between bridging (or inclusive) and bonding (or exclusive). There is some disagreement in the literature as to the usefulness of this distinction. On the one hand, Warde and Tampubolon warde&tampubolon (2002: 158) argue that the distinction has proved difficult to operationalise.

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