Editing Social capital (section)

== History ==
While it has been suggested that the term ''social capital'' was in intermittent use from about 1890, before becoming widely used in the late 1990s,<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=social+capital&year_start=1800&year_end=2008&corpus=0&smoothing=0 |title=Google Ngram Viewer |access-date=2014-04-20}}</ref> the earliest credited use is by [[L. J. Hanifan|Lyda Hanifan]] in 1916 (see 20th century below).

The debate of community versus [[Modernization theory|modernization]] of society and [[individualism]] has been the most discussed topic among the founders of [[sociology]]: such theorists as [[Ferdinand Tönnies|Tönnies]] (1887),<ref name=":1">Tonnies, F. (1955) [1887]. ''Community and Association''. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul</ref> [[Émile Durkheim|Durkheim]] (1893),<ref>Durkheim, E. (1893) "De la Division du Travail". Les Classiques de Science Sociale.</ref> [[Georg Simmel|Simmel]] (1905),<ref>Simmel, G. (1969) [1905] "The Metropolis and Mental Life", in Richard Sennet (eds) ''Classic Essays on the Culture of Cities''. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.</ref> [[Max Weber|Weber]] (1946)<ref name=":2">Weber, M. (1946) "The Protestant Sects and the Spirit of Capitalism". In Hans H. Gert and Mills C. Wright (eds) ''From Max Weber''. New York: Oxford University Press.</ref> were convinced that [[industrialisation]] and [[urbanization]] were transforming social relationships in an irreversible way. They observed a breakdown of traditional bonds and the progressive development of [[anomie]] and [[social alienation|alienation]] in society.<ref name=":3">Wilmott, P. 1986. ''Social Networks, Informal Care and Public Policy''. London: [[Policy Studies Institute]]. {{Page?|date=November 2022}}</ref>

=== 18th–19th century ===
The power of ''[[community governance]]'' has been stressed by many philosophers from antiquity to the 18th century, from [[Aristotle]] to [[Thomas Aquinas]], and [[Edmund Burke]].<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Bowles|first1=S.|last2=Gintis|first2=S.|year=2002|title=Social Capital and Community Governance|journal=The Economic Journal|volume=112|issue=483|pages=419–436|citeseerx=10.1.1.508.4110|doi=10.1111/1468-0297.00077|s2cid=12530827}}</ref> This vision was strongly criticised at the end of the 18th century, with the development of the idea of ''[[Homo economicus|Homo Economicus]]'' and subsequently with ''[[rational choice theory]]''. Such a set of theories became dominant in the last centuries, but many thinkers questioned the complicated relationship between ''modern society'' and the importance of ''old institutions'', in particular family and traditional communities.<ref name=":3" />

The concept that underlies social capital has a much longer history; thinkers exploring the relation between associational life and democracy were using similar concepts regularly by the 19th century, drawing on the work of earlier writers such as [[James Madison]] (''[[The Federalist Papers]]'') and [[Alexis de Tocqueville]] (''[[Democracy in America]]'') to integrate concepts of social cohesion and [[connectedness]] into the [[Pluralism (political theory)|pluralist]] tradition in [[American politics (political science)|American political science]]. [[John Dewey]] may have made the first direct mainstream use of ''social capital'' in ''[[The School and Society]]'' in 1899, though he did not offer a definition.

In the first half of the 19th century, de Tocqueville had observations about American life that seemed to outline and define social capital. He observed that Americans were prone to meeting at as many gatherings as possible to discuss all possible issues of state, economics, or the world that could be witnessed. The high levels of transparency caused greater participation from the people and thus allowed for democracy to work better.

=== 20th century ===
[[L. J. Hanifan]]'s 1916 article regarding local support for rural schools is one of the first occurrences of the term ''social capital'' in reference to social cohesion and personal investment in the community.<ref name=":4">[[L. J. Hanifan|Hanifan, L. J.]] 1916. "The rural school community center." ''[[Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science]]'' 67:130–138.</ref><ref>See also [[L. J. Hanifan|Hanifan, L. J.]] 1920. ''The Community Center''. Boston: [[Silver Burdett]].</ref> In defining the concept, Hanifan contrasts social capital with material goods by defining it as:<ref name=":4" />{{Rp|130–131}}<blockquote>I do not refer to real estate, or to personal property or to cold cash, but rather to that in life which tends to make these tangible substances count for most in the daily lives of people, namely, goodwill, fellowship, mutual sympathy and social intercourse among a group of individuals and families who make up a social unit.… If he may come into contact with his neighbour, 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.
</blockquote>Following the works of [[Ferdinand Tönnies|Tönnies]] (1887)<ref name=":1" /> and [[Max Weber|Weber]] (1946),<ref name=":2" /> reflection on social links in modern society continued with interesting contributions in the 1950s and in the 1960s. In particular, ''[[Social movement#Mass society theory|mass society theory]]''{{snd}}as developed by [[Daniel Bell]] (1962),<ref>[[Daniel Bell|Bell, Daniel]]. 1962. "America as a Mass Society." In ''[[The End of Ideology]]'', edited by D. Bell. New York: [[Collier Books]]</ref> [[Robert Nisbet]] (1969),<ref>[[Robert Nisbet|Nisbet, Robert A.]] 1969. ''The Quest for Community''. New York: [[Oxford University Press]]</ref> [[Maurice R. Stein]] (1960),<ref>[[Maurice R. Stein|Stein, Maurice R.]] 1960. ''The Eclipse of Community: an Interpretation of American Studies''. Princeton: [[Princeton University Press]].</ref> [[William H. Whyte]] (1956)<ref>[[William H. Whyte|Whyte, William H.]] 1956. ''[[The Organization Man]]''. New York: [[Simon & Schuster]].</ref>{{snd}}proposed themes similar to those of the founders, with a more pessimistic emphasis on the development of society. In the words of Stein (1960:1): "The price for maintaining a society that encourages cultural differentiation and experimentation is unquestionably the acceptance of a certain amount of disorganization on both the individual and social level."

[[Jane Jacobs]] used the term early in the 1960s. Although she did not explicitly define the term ''social capital'', her usage referred to the value of networks.<ref>{{cite book|last=Jacobs|first=Jane|url=https://archive.org/details/deathlifeofgre00jaco|title=The Death and Life of Great American Cities|publisher=Random House|year=1961|page=[https://archive.org/details/deathlifeofgre00jaco/page/138 138]|quote="If self-government in the place is to work, underlying any float of population must be a continuity of people who have forged neighborhood networks. These networks are a city's irreplaceable social capital. Whenever the capital is lost, from whatever cause, the income from it disappears, never to return until and unless new capital is slowly and chancily accumulated."|url-access=registration}}</ref> [[Political science|Political scientist]] Robert Salisbury advanced the term as a critical component of interest group formation in his 1969 article "An Exchange Theory of Interest Groups" in the ''[[Midwest Journal of Political Science]]''.

Sociologist [[Pierre Bourdieu]] used the term in 1972 in his ''Outline of a Theory of Practice'',<ref name="Bourdieu 1972">Bourdieu, Pierre. (1972) ''Outline of a Theory of Practice''</ref> and clarified the term some years later in contrast to [[cultural capital|cultural]], [[economic capital|economic]], administrative capital, [[physical capital]], [[political capital]], social capital and [[symbolic capital]].<ref>{{Cite book |title=Bourdieu, Pierre. (1986): [[Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste]] (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul).}}</ref> Sociologists [[James Samuel Coleman|James Coleman]] (1988),<ref name="auto" /> as well as [[Barry Wellman]] & Scot Wortley (1990),<ref>Wellman, Barry, and Scot Wortley. 1990. "Different Strokes from Different Folks: Community Ties and Social Support." ''[[American Journal of Sociology]]'' 96:558–588.</ref> adopted [[Glenn Loury]]'s 1977 definition in developing and popularising the concept.<ref>[[Glenn Loury|Loury, Glenn]]. 1977. "A Dynamic Theory of Racial Income Differences." Ch. 8 in ''Women, Minorities, and Employment Discrimination'', edited by P. A. Wallace and A. Le Mund.  Lexington, MA: [[Lexington Books]].</ref> In the late 1990s, the concept gained popularity, serving as the focus of a [[World Bank]] research programme {{Citation needed|reason=Nothing in the wiki pages of the following 2 books substantiates this apparent 'research program' as does anything from within either of their physical covers, this World Bank research program is unaccounted for|date=February 2025}} and the subject of several mainstream books, including [[Robert Putnam]]'s ''[[Bowling Alone]]'',<ref name="Putnam 2000">[[Robert Putnam|Putnam, Robert]]. 2000. ''[[Bowling Alone|Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community]]''. [[Simon & Schuster]].</ref> and Putnam & [[Lewis Feldstein]]'s ''[[Better Together (book)|Better Together]]''.

All of these reflections contributed remarkably to the development of the social capital concept in the following decades. The appearance of the modern social capital conceptualization is a new way to look at this debate, keeping together the importance of community to build generalized trust and the same time, the importance of individual free choice, in order to create a more cohesive society. It is for this reason that social capital generated so much interest in the academic and political world.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Rose|first1=N|year=2000|title=Community Citizenship and the Third Way|journal=American Behavioral Scientist|volume=43|issue=9|pages=1395–1411|doi=10.1177/00027640021955955|s2cid=145219829}}</ref>