Review of the Social Capital Literature - University of Queensland

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At the state level greater social capital may lead to increasing politicalparticipation, and hence affect government policy and action (Kawachi 1999).Although there does appear to be sound theoretical evidence of the associationsbetween social capital and health, there has been little empirical researchundertaken to substantiate this theory. Kawachi et al have conducted what theybelieve to be the ‘first empirical demonstration of an association between socialcapital and mortality’ (Kawachi, Kennedy et al. 1997). Building upon otherresearch into the relations between income inequality and mortality rates, theyhypothesise that income inequality is related to reduction in social cohesion andthat disinvestment in social capital is in turn associated with increased mortality.Working with data from the US General Social Survey they aim to conduct astate-level comparison of variations in social capital, income inequality andmortality rates. Social capital is measured using weighted responses to two itemsfrom the survey. Level of civic engagement is measured by per capita number ofgroups and associations to which residents in each state belong (1997: 1492).Trust in others, the second component of social capital, was assessed byresponses to the two GSS survey items on trust and taking advantage (seesection 3.2.3 above). They found income inequality to be strongly correlated withboth per capita group membership and lack of social trust, while both social trustand group membership were associated with total mortality. A major finding ofthe study is that the size of the gap between the rich and the poor is powerfullyand negatively related to level of investment in social capital. They conclude thatthe data support the hypothesis that income inequality leads to increasedmortality via disinvestment in social capital.More recently Siahpus h and Singh (Siahpush and Singh 1999) have alsoconducted an empirical analysis into the relationship between social integrationand mortality. Conceptualising social integration as a component of social capital(Siahpush and Singh 1999: 571), they work upon the general hypothesis thatsocial integration leads to lower levels of mortality in Australia. Social integrationis measured by indicators such as; percentage of people living alone, divorcerate, unemployment rate, proportion of people who are discouraged job seekers,and unionisation rate. Drawing upon data from the Australian Bureau of Statisticsdatasets from 1990-1996 results show that higher levels of social integration, asmeasured by all indicators except unionisation, were associated with lowermortality rates. With unionisation, higher levels were associated with increasedmortality rates (Siahpush and Singh 1999: 571). The authors note that theirfindings relating to unionisation appear to contradict those of Kawachi (Kawachi,Kennedy et al. 1997), and suggest this is due to the fact that Kawachi included avariety of groups in their measurement of group membership. Siahpush andSingh suggest that in the light of their results, it may be unwise to put all groupstogether and assume group membership will always have a positive effect onhealth (Siahpush and Singh 1999: 575). 44 A potential problem in this study is the authors’ interchangeable use of social integration andsocial capitalFebruary 2001 DRAFT ONLY 20
4.3 Social Capital and Housing Policy/Community DevelopmentLittle work has measured the impact of social capital on housing, and what littleexists tends to be placed within the community development literature. There ishowever increasing interest in this area, reflected in the 1988 publication of aspecial edition of Housing Policy Debate dedicated to social capital and housingpolicy. The quality of housing gains consideration by Saegert and Winkel, in theirassertion that social capital can be an effective component of locally sponsoredlow-income housing programs (Saegert and Winkel 1998). Social capital ismeasured at the level of the building, where it is seen to have greatest potentialfor effectiveness in improving housing quality and security. Their social capitalmeasure was based upon 14 items, eight of which inquired about residentinvolvement in the social and organizational functioning of the buildings, while theother six looked at residents’ assessments of the extensiveness of participation inbuilding activities by other residents. These were then hypothesised to describefour within-building social capital factors: basic tenant association participation,informal building organisation, leadership activity and perceived prosocial norms.Results showed that social capital was higher in tenant-owned co-ops andmediated the effect of ownership on building conditions. It was a more potentmediator in ownership forms that both nurtured and depended on social capital,these mainly being tenant ownership and to a lesser extent, community groupownership. Overall, the study showed that alternative forms of ownership thancontinuing city ownership resulted in better building quality and safety (although itwas noted that substantial public investment would still be required).Moving from housing quality to neighbourhood, Temkin and Rohe (Temkin andRohe 1998) consider the affect of social capital on neighbourhood stability. Usingdata taken largely from the Pittsburgh Neighbourhood Study (1990), they presenta model of neighbourhood change using two constitutive elements of socialcapital as explanatory variables, sociocultural milieu and institutionalinfrastructure. 5 Social milieu subsumes the concepts of social fabric and socialstructural characteristics of neighbourhoods. The construct included variablesdesigned to measure the following; the extent to which residents felt theirneighbourhood was spatially distinct, interaction with each other, whetherresidents work and socialise in the neighbourhood, and whether they useneighbourhood facilities. Institutional infrastructure measures the level and qualityof formal organisations in the neighbourhood, and these variables measure thelevel of voting activity, and the visibility and perceived effectiveness ofneighbourhood organisations. Following initial analysis the statistically significantcompone nts, measuring political activity, neighbourhood loyalty and attachment,and whether the neighbourhood is a good place to live were summed to form themeasure of social capital. The results showed that the two constitutive elementsof social capital had positive and significant effects upon the measure ofneighbourhood stability, suggesting that neighbourhoods with higher levels ofsocial capital (as measured by greater degrees of a sociocultural milieu and5Analagous to Putnam’s notions of civic engagement and trust (Putnam, 1998: 62)February 2001 DRAFT ONLY 21
Page 6 and 7: cooperation. Social trust, as oppos
Page 8 and 9: ? Bridging social capital - consist
Page 10 and 11: highlighted in section 4, but many
Page 12 and 13: The questionnaire was administered
Page 14 and 15: others as mean, selfish or unreliab
Page 16 and 17: 4.1 Social Capital and EducationCol
Page 18 and 19: ural/urban high school drop out rat
Page 22 and 23: institutional infrastructure) are m
Page 24 and 25: Kennedy et al also hypothesised tha
Page 26 and 27: focused upon the different ways of
Page 28 and 29: 6. BibliographyBourdieu, P. (1986).
Page 30: Sampson, R. J., S. W. Raudenbush, e

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