ABSTRACT
Introduction Social capital is an interdisciplinary and multidimensional concept. Numerous authors from various disciplines have deepened its study, often proposing their own definitions. Social capital is also difficult to identify and measure directly as its nature relies upon many different aspects of social structures. Social capital can therefore be studied from various perspectives and according to the characteristics of the particular system of social interactions under consideration: on social relationships (Bourdieu 1986; Coleman 1988; Portes 1995); on trust, network and civicness (Putnam et al. 1993; Fukuyama 1995); and on formal institutional structures and institutional environment (Olson 1965, 1982; North 1990; Woolcock and Narayan 20001). Despite the seemingly disparate nature of the numerous definitions of social capital proposed in the literature, they share a common element: social capital – such as physical and human capital – is considered productive (Coleman 1990), and its principal output is to overcome collective action problems and increase advantageous reciprocally cooperative behaviours within a society (Uphoff 1999). Social capital is, therefore, a resource for action, growth and socio-economic development as it provides cognitive resources (e.g. information) or normative resources (e.g. trust), links different actors to each other, simplifies their coordination and allows them to achieve specific goals that would otherwise be out of reach or that would be with prohibitively high costs (Trigilia 2001; Stolle 2003). In the literature on social capital, however, one important limitation still exists. It is not clear how social capital is generated, and which mechanisms influence social capital formation. Some authors (see, for instance, Putnam 1995 and Fukuyama 1995) claim that the production of social capital is determined mainly, if not exclusively, by historical factors. These historical factors include long-term socio-cultural mechanisms based on ethical and moral systems, religious beliefs and social customs that are handed down through generations. This ‘historical’ perspective, which leaves little room for social capital to be generated and accumulated by specific actions carried out by public and private institutions in an established society, is criticised by a group of scholars (i.e. Evans
1996; Woolcock 1998; Hooghe and Stolle 2003). These authors stress the relevance of interaction and networks developed among citizens and between them and public or private organisations to generate and increase social capital. Additionally, they note that social relationships, interactions and networks are not naturally given and people must invest their resources in order to build and institutionalise them. Given the social and economic importance of social capital, it is fundamental to understand and clarify the sources of social capital as well as how it is formed, since this will allow us to understand the possibilities for influencing its level and productivity. According to Hooghe and Stolle (2003), it is possible to distinguish two main different approaches to ‘the various mechanisms and sources that are responsible for the generation of social capital’ (Hooghe and Stolle 2003: 2): an ‘institution-centred approach’ and a ‘society-centred approach’. The first approach, introduced in the middle of the 1990s, focuses on the ability of the state and public institutions to influence the formation of social capital. Some authors highlight that, through specific and focused public policies, it is possible to increase civicness, social involvement, trust in the institutions, reciprocity and cooperation among citizens. Among these authors, Verba et al. (1995) and Hall (2002) show the existence of a strong relationship between civic participation and the level and the distribution of public education, emphasising that suitable and specific educational policies are able to influence the level of social capital of a community in the long run. Rothstein (1998) shows that individuals’ inclination to engage in cooperative behaviour may be influenced by public welfare institutions as these types of institutions are able to significantly affect the quality of daily life. The influence of education, public health, unemployment benefits and social services on everyday life is often greater than the influence of voluntary organisations and informal networks of interpersonal relationships. The credibility of welfare state institutions therefore plays a fundamental role in the individual perception of the surrounding society and influences consequently cooperative behaviour. Finally, Stolle (2003) and Torpe (2003) demonstrate that in Scandinavian countries, where income and gender inequalities are very narrow thanks to the redistributive role of the welfare state, the spread of trust is significantly more elevated compared to the United States. The second approach is based on the relevance of social interaction among people and the importance of civic and voluntary associations as a ‘special’ place able to increase (quantitatively) and to intensify and improve (qualitatively) individuals’ preferences. These associations are emphasised in the literature as a ‘school of democracy’ as they contribute to building and spreading values, trust and norms among citizens (Brehm and Rahn 1997; Hooghe 2003; Putnam et al. 1993; Stolle and Rochon 1998). However, the society-centred approach pays little attention to the complexity of this sector. Most of the studies on social capital following this approach rely mainly on civic and voluntary associations, disregarding other types of organisations such as cooperatives and social enterprises. Above all, they seem to consider relevant only advocacy associations and not the organisations that produce goods and services for the
benefit of the community. Therefore, they do not distinguish among the different activities that these organisations perform (advocacy versus productive), despite their different effect on social capital. Some studies seem to show how some civic or voluntary organisations, such as advocacy organisations, are sometimes oriented to pursue the private interests of their members rather than any collective interest (Olson 1965, 1982; Degli Antoni 2009a). This may then have the perverse effect of exacerbating divisions within local communities, producing detrimental effects for individuals or particular groups (Portes and Sensebrenner 1993; Numerato and Baglioni 2011). This also could discourage the birth of new enterprises and reduce the ability of communities to attract external investment (Sciarrone 2000). On the contrary, other organisations, such as cooperatives and social enterprises, which produce goods and services of general interest, may be more oriented toward the common good and improving the quality of life in the local community in which they operate. Moreover, their democratic and inclusive governance based on the ‘one member, one vote’ rule and ‘multistakeholder’ participation have an important impact on social cohesion (Borzaga and Spear 2004; Birchall 2010). In this chapter, we focus our attention on the society-centred approach, and we utilise theoretical and empirical studies to better understand how different not-for-profit organisations relate to the creation and accumulation of social capital both within their own organisations and in the communities and territories in which they operate, and how they produce different types of social capital (bonding or bridging social capital). The first part of this chapter is dedicated to the discussion developed so far on the role of civic organisations, while the second part, despite limited research in this area, is dedicated to cooperative and social enterprises and to their ability to generate and foster social capital.
