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11 - From James S. Coleman, “Social Capital in the Creation of Human Capital”

from III - Later Foundations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 October 2021

Mario L. Small
Affiliation:
Harvard University, Massachusetts
Brea L. Perry
Affiliation:
Indiana University, Bloomington
Bernice Pescosolido
Affiliation:
Indiana University, Bloomington
Edward B. Smith
Affiliation:
Northwestern University, Illinois
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Summary

This essay gives an outline of the main research questions of social capital theory and its foundation in the seminal paper by Coleman (1988) on the creation of human capital through social capital. The research questions address the discussions about the elements that make a network beneficial, the emergence of social capital and the relation with other resources, inequality of social capital between groups, and social capital measurements. State of the art research is presented, and the discussions in exemplary social capital research fields are summarized, such as the debate about functional communities, the Mouw-Lin debate, and the community-decline debate. The necessity of parental social capital for the creation of children’s human capital is questioned. The chapter takes stock of the research concerning these debates, sketches open questions, and provides directions for future research. In particular, the combination of different data sources and the extension of the work to new research sites seems promising.

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