Social Capital in Europe: Similarity of Countries and Diversity of People?

The Relationship Between Social Capital and Individualism–Collectivism in Europe

“…Thus, our findings show that the positive relationship between social capital and individualism that has been found at the cultural level (see Allik & Realo, 2004;Realo et al, 2008) also holds at the individual level: people who emphasize independent thought, action, and readiness to change are not only more willing to believe that most people can be trusted and are honest (cf. Gheorghiu et al, 2009) (Halpern, 2005;Lin, 2000;Lin & Erickson, 2008;Meulemann, 2008a;Putnam, 2000Putnam, & 2002 has shown that age, gender, education, and settlement type all influence social capital accumulation at the individual level, our findings suggest that there is something else that explains individual differences in the degree of social capital at the individual level.…”

“…However, social capital tends to be unequally distributed between individuals, groups, and countries (Lin, 2000;Lin & Erickson, 2008;Meulemann, 2008a;Putnam, 2002;Wuthnow, 2002). That, of course, raises the question of what are the sources and determinants of social capital at the individual as well as group levels which could explain these inequalities.…”

“…That means that social capital may function in an exclusionary way, causing exclusion rather than inclusion. Indeed, research has shown that social capital may significantly differ by individual, group, and country (Lin, 2000;Lin & Erickson, 2008;Meulemann, 2008aMeulemann, , 2008bNeller, 2008;Putnam, 2002;Schmitt-Beck, 2008;van der Meer, Scheepers, & Grotenhuis, 2008).…”

“…There have been warnings about the looming danger of the concept of social capital becoming a 'handy catch-all, for-all, and cure-all sociological term' (Lin & Erickson, 2008;p 235), as it means so many different things to so many people (Engbers, Thompson, & Slaper, 2015;Meulemann, 2008a). Guillen and colleagues (2011) have raised concerns about the unclear definition and measurement of social capital.…”

Politische Soziologie in Deutschland — Forschungsfelder, Analyseperspektiven, ausgewählte empirische Befunde

“…B. Norris 1999;Pharr/Putnam 2000). Ein noch breiteres Themenspektrum decken der aus dem Projekt "Citizen Involvement and Democracy" hervorgegangene Forschungsbericht (van Deth et al 2007a) sowie einige inhaltlich ähn-lich ausgerichtete Publikationen ab (van Deth 2004;Meulemann 2008). Sie verwenden das Konzept des Sozialkapitals als theoretische Grundlage, beziehen die Entwicklungen in den postkommunistischen Gesellschaften ein und versuchen noch stärker als die im Sammelband von Norris enthaltenen Beiträge, mikro-und makroanalytische Perspektiven miteinander zu verknüpfen.…”