Ken,
I've taken some quotations out of Ben Fine's long book, Social Capital
vs Social Theory: Political Economy and Social Science at the Turn of
the Millennium, to illustrate in condensed form my objections to this
term and the concepts that underlie it. So this is out of a much more
comprehensive analysis and I'm briefly citing a few points that stand
out for me.
________________
Ben Fine:
"social capital becomes a dumping ground for synthesis across the social
sciences.."

"...social capital is simply an oxymoron. To be otherwise, there would
have to be some sort of capital that is not social, relative to which
social capital has the potential to be distinctive. As capital,
especially as embedded within capitalism, is profoundly social and
historical in context, this is not possible." [The use of the term] is
an acknowledgement that the economy is dependent upon and is affected by
the non-economic...there is no capital that is not social."

"Capital is only appropriately understood as social from the outset in
the economic relations that it encompasses. Any use of the term social
capital is an implicit acceptance of the stance of mainstream economics,
in which capital is first and foremost a set of asocial endowments....
The weakness of the notion of social capital is not in what it does
present but in what it does not...If social capital seeks to bring the
social back in to enrich the understanding of capitalism, it does no
only because it has impoverished the understanding of capital by taking
it out of its social and historical context."

In Putnam, "social capital is identified with the formation of
associations within civil society in the interstices between the
government and the economy....social capital in Putnam is disassociated
from the broader context in which it is supposed to be both created and
have effects....[He leaves out] the role of the central
state...democracy, governance, policy, and associational activity itself
[which]are hardly liable to be independent of such factors." 

"All in all it's a romantic view of voluntarism and associations."

Fine offers these questions:
"Why has social capital proved so popular with limited effective
critical response? What is the significance of social capital for
understanding the way in which social theory is currently being produced
and, in particular, for the shirting relationship between economics and
the other social sciences.  

"Social capital is...attractive to conservatives for having taken the
state off the agenda and for putting anything other than it in the role
of social provider....Social capital is really a posture towards the
less fortunate of self-help and charity raised from the individual to
the community level."

It is interesting to me that the use of this term arises as a buzz word
precisely at the moment that we have large cuts in social welfare,
increasing layoffs due to globalization, and other destabilizing effects
of capital movements.

Fine also notes that Putnam fails to discuss political power "and the
unequal access to so-called social capital, [as well as making an odd]
distinction between politics and civil society."


Richard Hofrichter
Senior Analyst, Health Equity
National Association of County & City Health Officials
1100 17th St. NW
Washington, DC 20036
Tel: 202-783-5550 x211
Fax: 202-783-1583
email: [log in to unmask]

-----Original Message-----
From: Social Determinants of Health [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
Thompson, Kenneth
Sent: Sunday, January 21, 2007 11:04 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: "Social Capital" vs. "Neomaterialist" Interpretations of
Health Inequalities

Hi richard et al.

I have to admit, I have never really felt that social capital and social
theory were necessarily much in conflict- of course that's at least
partially because my operational definition of social capital is simply
a new "third way" term for the capacity for human beings to act
collectively to solve problems and build their future (of course it can
be used for other purposes).  Its essentially solidarity and collective
empowerment- and requires trust, common vision or at least shared
visions.  It can cross class, geographic, race/ethinic lines.  But it
doesn't heve to. Conflict does not dissappear with the invention of the
term social capital.  The creation of social capital is driven by the
circumstances people are in, how they interpret those circumstances and
how they work with other people in shaping these. Its implications are
for health are about what kind of social ecologies we fashion- ecologies
that determine our health and mental health.. 

Am I missing something?

ken

-----Original Message-----
From: Social Determinants of Health [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
Richard Hofrichter
Sent: Friday, January 19, 2007 2:38 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [SDOH] "Social Capital" vs. "Neomaterialist"
Interpretations of Health Inequalities

Apart from Carles Muntanter's work, the best full-throated critique of
social capital, in my view, can be found in Ben Fine's book, Social
Theory vs. Social Capital.

Richard

Richard Hofrichter
Senior Analyst, Health Equity
National Association of County & City Health Officials 1100 17th St. NW
Washington, DC 20036
Tel: 202-783-5550 x211
Fax: 202-783-1583
email: [log in to unmask]

-----Original Message-----
From: Social Determinants of Health [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
Richard Carpiano
Sent: Friday, January 19, 2007 10:50 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: "Social Capital" vs. "Neomaterialist" Interpretations of
Health Inequalities

And regretfully, Dennis, Putnam's popular conception of social capital
has disengaged the concept from social class, of which it has long been
recognized to be an integral component of how class "works" in our lives

(e.g., as in Marx's notion of a class within itself vs. a class for
itself, Weber's "Class, Status, and Party" and the work of more
contemporary folks like Pierre Bourdieu, Loic Wacquant, Alejandro
Portes, Wm. J. Wilson, Nan Lin, and Eric Klinenberg, among countless
others).

Rich

Dennis Raphael wrote:
>
> and this...
>
> N. Pearce and G. Davey Smith
> Is Social Capital the Key to Inequalities in Health?
> Am J Public Health, January 1, 2003; 93(1): 122 - 129. 
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--
__________________________________
Richard M. Carpiano, PhD, MA, MPH
Assistant Professor
Department of Sociology
University of British Columbia
6303 NW Marine Drive, Room 2216
Vancouver, BC CANADA V6T 1Z1
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