Toward an alternative framework for social capital as social change

Over the past three decades, the literature on social capital has associated norms and networks of trust, reciprocity and cooperation with improvements in economic development, social cohesion and democratic governance. Critical views of social capital claim that the literature overlooks the role of power relations, hierarchical structures and social inequalities, which are reflected in and sustained through social norms and networks that are established and imposed by the dominant classes (for an overview, see Christoforou 2014). Some of these authors point to the much neglected work of Pierre Bourdieu.