KACL Social Capital Policy
Analysis Paper
June 7 2010
Background
The intent of this paper is to analyze a number of broader policy issues relating to Social Capital. The Association's paper on Social Citizenship should be read along with this paper. The former paper considers the issues of entitlement and what services or funding assistance should be provided.
Social Capital
Defined
According to Putnam the term "Social
Capital" has been independently invented by several commentators of the
20th century to draw attention to the ways in which our lives are made more
productive (and meaningful) by social ties. The first according to Putnam was
L.J. Hanifan used the term to refer to
Those tangible substances [that] count for
most in the daily lives of people: namely goodwill, fellowship, sympathy, and
social intercourse among individuals and families who make up a social unit. The
individual is helpless socially, if left to himself. If he comes into contact
with his neighbours, and they with other neighbours, there will be an
accumulation of social capital, which may immediately satisfy his social needs
and which may bear a social potentiality sufficient to the substantial
improvement of living conditions in the whole community. The community as
a whole will benefit by the cooperation of all its parts, while the individual
will find in his associations the advantages of the help, the sympathy, and the
fellowship of his neighbours. [1]
The same idea according to Putnam was independently discovered by Canadian Sociologists to characterize club memberships of suburbanites, by Jane Jacobs to laud neighbourliness and James Colman to refer to the ability of people to work together for common purposes in groups and organizations.
On
Putnam’s website http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/saguaro/, social capital refers "to the collective value of all "social
networks" [who people know] and the inclinations that arise from these
networks to do things for each other ["norms of reciprocity"]."
In his book Better Together, he indicates
that social capital refers to social
networks, norms or reciprocity, mutual assistance, and trustworthiness
How does social capital work?
The term social capital emphasizes a wide
variety of benefits that flow from the trust, reciprocity, information, and
cooperation associated with social networks. Social capital creates value for
the people who are connected and
a. information flows (e.g. learning
about jobs, learning about candidates running for office, exchanging ideas at
college, etc.) depend on social capital
b. Norms of reciprocity (mutual aid)
are dependent on social networks
c. Collective action depends upon
social networks (e.g., the role that the black church played in the civic
rights movement) although collective action also can foster new networks.
d. Broader identities and solidarity are encouraged by social networks that help translate an "I" mentality into a "we" mentality.
Some examples of social capital?
A neighbour tells some
neighbourhood child bully to stop teasing another child because it’s not the
right thing to do.
When two business men
arrive at an agreement and carry on business based on the agreement without
reduction of the agreement to a legal document because they are Rotarians and
agree that the four way test will govern.
A particular church
provides “welfare to its members” and in return the member is expected to help
someone else in need.
E
Components of Social Networks
Social networks might be examined and parsed according to various frameworks and classification schemes. In sociological textbooks the most common division is by social entity type such as Family and Kinship, Neighbourhoods, Employment networks including Supervisors, coworkers and subordinates, Church, School etc. Another common useful classification is by actual interaction such as one found in Pilisuk and Parks (1986) Page 121 (See Appendix B). The first type of classification may be more useful for describing places or locations where work might be done to build social networks. The latter type might be more useful in measuring social capital or caring and will be discussed below under the issue of measuring social capital
By Classifications by Social Entity
Employment or Businesses
Employment relationships are the social entities that we have our most interactions with after family. In other cultures such as Japan possibly even more than family.
School and Learning Institutes
Schools, Colleges and Universities occupy a significant time in our early lives. Later we may involve ourselves in continuing educations, training for leisure activities or upgrading.
Churches and Religious Affiliations
Reginald Bibby has detailed in several books the declining role of religion and church affiliations in our daily lives but most yet the number of those who can identify the church or religions affiliation that they don’t attend is still quite large.
Faith-based
communities – Potential Role
One long-time faithful member of the Association expressed disappointment with the organized church. But, “People should not confuse church-anity with Christianity.”
In John McKnight’s The Careless Society exclaims “It is not enough… to ask whether someone says he or she is serving Christ. There are bad and good servants”. Bad servants conquer, dominate, exploit and control. They become lords rather than servants. McKnight questions whether the human reality is always to make servant hood into lordship. Christ concluding remarks in St. John’s reporting of the last Supper was to call his disciples friends rather than servants. McKnight concludes:
Perhaps beyond the revolution of Christian Service is the final revolution, the possibility of being friends. Friends are people who know, care, respect, struggle, love, justice, and have a commitment to each other through time.
Why friends rather than servants? Perhaps it is because He (Christ) knew that servants could always become lords but that friends could not. Servants are people who know the mysteries that can control those to whom they can give “help”. Friends are people who know each other. They are free to give and receive help.
Could the Church become a place where persons with disabilities might find friends?
Cultural, Fraternal and Service and Social and Recreational Clubs and
Associations
Probably passing religion in importance in our daily or weekly lives are those clubs or groups we join because they satisfy our interests or hobbies or social needs. These include such organizations as Scottish Country Dancing, Ukrainian Club, Genealogy Clubs, Garden Clubs, Kinsman, Lions, Rotary, Baseball and Bowling Teams. These all have one thing in common- they are optional. We choose to belong – not out of necessity but by choice. They may play a very significant or less significant role. We may join out of belief that they will further our careers but generally because we enjoy such activities and social gatherings. The role that they play in economics, recreational or existential terms may vary significantly from person to person.
As in every
other sector, when someone invites persons with handicaps into a cultural
organization they enter. Entry fees or ticket prices are at times a
problem. At other times having an interested friend is a requirement.
The Cultural Organization may provide the context which determines whether consumers like other members of the organization have a common interest. However an organization may be welcoming or not. For example, some Robbie Burns’ organizations still discourage the involvement of women in such organizations as they did in the Bards own period (1758-1796). Other similar organizations have evolved and now encourage the inclusion of women. Some cultural organizations and service clubs require further evolution to support the inclusion of the disabled.
Courts have
entered the fray at times with decisions that affects the club as in when they
have declared that Human Rights legislation requires non
Quite apart from the lack of invitation, membership fees tend to make membership prohibitive.
How do you Measure Social Capital, Community Capacity
Many will scoff at the suggestion that one can “measure” such things as caring relationships, friendships, social ties or social networks as if such things are reducible to numbers or could be quantified in terms of dollars worth. Pilisuk and Parks (1986) [1] suggested that if caring relationships and social ties are important then surely it is worth the effort to try to learn how to measure them. If for no other reason that the fact that those who hold power in our society are not capable of understanding anything that can not be discussed in terms of “Accountability” “Numbers” or “Dollars”.
One possible starting point may be found in the following table taken from Pilisuk and Parks (1986) page 130.
|
|
Term |
Functional Expression |
Measurable Index |
|
Structural
Factors |
Composition or Source |
Categories of individuals comprising the supportive
association, or category or source of supportive function to the individual
in the supportive association (e.g., kin, friends, coworkers, etc) |
Ratios of kin to friends, neighbours to
kin, etc.; further defined as ratios of close kin to close friends, etc. |
|
Accessibility |
Ease with which any member of the
supportive unit can be reached (e.g., primary or secondary associations) for
the supportive function of an individual or overall for the group. |
Level of association (e.g., number of kin-1,
meaning kin directly connecting with individual; number of kin-2, or kin
connecting with someone who connects directly to individual, etc). |
|
|
Density |
Degree to which all members in the
association are linked to one another. |
Ratio of average number of
interconnections per individual per group, divided by the total number of
people in the group. |
|
|
Cluster |
Degree to which members in the
association form cliques. |
Number of high density subgroups
connected by singular or loose ties. |
|
|
Stability |
Degree to which group structure changes
over a period of time. |
Sum of the changes in composition
accessibility, density, and cluster factors, taken over time. |
|
|
Functional or Interactional Factors |
Frequency |
Number of supportive transactions
occurring per tie. |
Actual number of transactions per
connection and across single linkages. |
|
Duration |
Degree to which supportive interaction
changes or remains the same over time. |
Period of time during which transactions
recur over the same linkages. |
|
|
Mode |
Means or type of transaction; for
example, personal exchange, telephone conversation, or letters. |
Levels of exchange; number of primary (personal
contact); secondary (telephone contact); and tertiary (letter or third party)
transactions. |
|
|
Intimacy |
Centrality to the individual of the
exchange. |
Subjective ranking of closeness, most
often based on frequency, duration, and mode of interaction. |
|
|
Multiplexity |
The number of different types of
exchange, either per individual, or per larger association. |
Actual number of different types of
exchange across a linkage. |
|
|
Symmetry |
The reciprocity and mutual participation
in exchanges. |
Ratio of directed transaction of A to B
and B to A. |
|
|
Stability |
The loss or reestablishment of contacts,
and the expectations that they will continue to be of functional value. |
Composite index of changes in frequency,
duration, mode, intimacy, and multiplexity over time. |
Classifications by degree of interactions
Zone 1: Family or Household
While role of the family and its role as the primary bedrock social unit of the nations may have changed down through the years it still represents the most important network available to most individuals. While due to death of an individual or a relationship some of us may not ever know or have most intimate connects to all members of our family we are all born of a mother and begotten by a father. Generally the family is completed with one or more siblings all though the number per family unit is continually decreasing. While the number of single parent families and alternate families is ever increasing, and in some small pockets the extended family is still important, the basic unit is till composed of two “parents”. Step parents may play important roles – at time even more that the birth parent.
Families are affected by the culture of the society in which they exist and change over time as the culture changes. Cultures differ in their degree to which they might be described as individualistic or at the other pole collectivistic. In a truly individualistic society neither family or outside of family associations are strong. In some societies (dubbed familistic societies by Francis Fukuyama[2]) families are very strong and voluntary associations are weak – possibly because unrelated families have no basis for trusting one another. Perhaps in the case of person with mental disabilities early negative experiences have caused the family to close itself of to outside associations.
Zone 2 - Emotional Significant People
Emotional significant people would include “lovers”, our most intimate friends, our most intimate neighbours, significantly emotionally involved children or siblings after leaving the family home, those who we might describe as “soul mates”. Such individuals can play a very significant role in providing us with stability, relief from the toils and tribulations of life’s difficulties, they may sustain us in time of grief or sorrow, they may get us through difficult dimes and in the good times we enjoy their company, celebrate and relax. They may include some co-workers.
Zone 3 – Casual Relationships
Casual friends and acquaintances would fit in this zone, so would co workers not in zone 2, those we interact with, but not in intimate or with close affinity.
Zone 4 –People we meet on Special Occasions
For most of others professionals such as Doctors, dentists, friends of those in closer zones with whom we do not interact with on a daily basis, neighbours who we have not had close personal relationships.
Two Forms of Social Capital: Bonding Social Capital and Bridging Social Capital
In their book, Better Together, Putnam and Felstein distinguish between bonding social capital and bridging Social Capital:
Some networks link people who are similar
in crucial respects and tend to be inward looking: bonding social capital.
Others encompass different types of people and tend to be outward
A society that has only bonding social capital … [.will segregate into separate camps]. So a pluralist democracy requires lots of bridging capital, not just the bonding variety...The problem is the bridging social capital is harder to create than bonding capital social capital…So the kind of social capital that is essential for healthy public life in an increasing diverse society like ours is precisely the kind that is hardest to build
You can have bonding social capital increased among a group of persons with disabilities but who are segregated from the rest of the community. Building inclusive communities requires first bridging social capital and then bonding social capital.
How Can Social Capital be increased for Persons with Disabilities.
- Increase training for compassion in school system
- Increase levels of inclusion in all societies institutions
- Train parents how to ask for inclusion in practical ways
- Increase level of comfort with neighbours
- These spot reserved for your suggestions
What does KACL have to Change in order to assist Consumers and Families to increase social capital
- These spot reserved for your suggestions
Appendix A KACL
The goal of KACL is to ensure that all persons with special needs have the opportunity to live a meaningful and satisfying lifestyle and interact as an equal in their community by providing continuing opportunities for personal growth through education, training, support, advocacy and an informed public.
Appendix B Personal Network Map
Appendix A Reference
Website Information
For
more information on social capital, read Chapter 1 of Bowling
Alone or see the following websites:
http://www.cpn.org/sections/tools/models/social_capital.html.
For
information on the atomized society that we live in and the problems that its
engenders, see:
Bauman, Zymunt (2001) The Individualized Society, Malden, MA Blackwell Publishers Inc
Bellah, Robert N. et al. (1985) Habits of the Heart, Individualism and Commitment in American Life, New York: Harper & Row
Other good Resources include:
Amado, Angela Novak, Friendships and Community Connections between People With and Without Developmental Disabilities, Baltimore, Maryland: Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co, 1993
Bellah, Robert N. et al. (1991) The Good Society,
Block, Peter (2008) Community, The
Structure of Belonging, San Francisco Berrett
Brehony, Kathleen (1999) Ordinary Grace, An
Examination of The Roots of Companion, Altruism, and Empathy, and The Ordinary
Individuals Who Help Others in Extraordinary Ways,
Etzioni, Amitai (1993) The Spirit of Community, Rights, Responsibilities and the Communitarian Agenda, New York: Crown Publishers, 1993
Etzioni, Amitai (1995) New Communitarian
Thinking, Persons, Virtues, Institutions, and Communities: Charlotville and
Etzioni, Amitai (2001) Next, The Road to the Good Society, New York: Perseus, 2001
Fukuyama, Francis (1995) Trust, The Social Virtues and the Creation of Prosperity, New York: Free Press, 1995
Groce, Nora Ellen, Everyone Here Spoke Sign Language, Cambridge, Harvard University Press 1985,
Hayek, F.A. The Fatal Conceit, Chicago: University of Chicago, 1988
Hope, Anne and Sally Timmel, Training for Transformation, A Handbook for Community Workers Books 1, 2, 3, Gweru: Mambo Press, 1988
Kretzmann, John P and John L McKnight, A
Path Towards Finding and Mobilizing a Community’s Assets,
McKnight, John, The Careless Society, Community and Its Counterfeits,
New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 1995
Micklethwait, John and Adrian Wooldridge (2000) A Future Perfect, The Challenge and Hidden Promise of Globalization, New York: Crown Business, 2000
Peck, M. Scott (1987) The Different Drum, Community Making and Peace, New York: Simon & Schuster
Pilisuk, Marc and Susan Parks (1986) The
Healing Web, Social Networks and Human Survival Hanover, NH: University Press
of
Putnam,
Robert D. (2000) Bowling Alone, The Collapse and Revival of American Community,
New York: Simon & Schuster.
Putnam, Robert D. and Lewis M. Feldstein (2003) Better Together, Restoring the American Community, New York: Simon & Schuster
Reich, Robert B. (2001) The Success of Future, New York: Alfred A Knopf, 2001
Rubin, Lillian B. (1985) Just Friends, The Role of Friendship in Our Lives, New York: Harper & Row
Sergiovanni, Thomas J (1994) Building Community in Schools, San Francisco: Jossey Bass
[3] Quoted from Bowling Alone, Page 19