Browsing by Subject "Social Capital"

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Open Access
The appeal of social capital: analyzing the conceptualization of the concept
(2018-05) Erden, Veysel Yiğit
This thesis aims to make an analysis of conceptualization and operationalization of the concept of ‘social capital’ in the social sciences. Therefore, this thesis looks for answers to the questions such as why the scientific community focused on the conceptualization and operationalization of this concept more frequently compared to several other concepts which could have gained popularity in social science literature, and how and why the number of references to the concept of social capital started to increase dramatically in literature during the 1990s and 2000s. For answering the two main questions of this thesis, the most cited academic studies according to Google Scholar were examined in detail to comprehend the main framework used by wellknown scholars to conceptualize and operationalize the concept of social capital. This thesis identified that the scientific community focused on the conceptualization and operationalization of the concept of social capital due to the explanatory power of the concept as opposed to concepts such as financial capital, physical capital and human capital for the transformation in and complexity of industrial societies. It does so by also examining the types of and questions around measurement while using the concept. Other concepts were considered as less comprehensive for explaining the transformation processes especially in economic development, employment, poverty alleviation and democracy at the micro and macro levels in the modern world. Furthermore, by operationalizing social capital as the independent variable, scholars were also able to capture the post-1990 transformations in the advanced industrialized world better, especially when holding other variables constant. Thus, both its explanatory power and the shortcomings of the other concepts in capturing the transformation led to its appeal.
Open Access
Educate or adjudicate? Socioeconomic heterogeneity and welfare
(Routledge, 2017) Neyapti, B.
I present a formal framework to explore the welfare and distributional effects of a government’s optimal choice over two types of public spending in a closed economy: domestic security (DS) and investment in social capital (SC). Production is characterized as a function of social and physical capital stocks that both vary across the regions. DS stands for total factor productivity, while SC stands for human capital and civic cooperativeness combined. SC accumulates via public spending on universal primary education, cultural, and civic events and such, and is exposed to regional spillover effects. Numerical simulations of the static solution of the government’s welfare maximization problem reveal that the optimal rate of spending on SC (m*) is negatively related with the income share of physical capital, SC spillovers and fiscal decentralization. Simulations also show that SC homogeneity is positively associated with both the level and equitability of aggregate income. The maximum attainable levels of income, welfare and social cohesion and the most equitable incomes are all observed to realize at some intermediate range of m* values. In case DS augments SC, however, social cohesion improves and welfare declines monotonously in m*. © 2016 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
Open Access
Local participation and social capital in women's development projects : influence of external versus internal financing on NGOs in Turkey
(2008) Walterova, Iva
Sustainable development has been a great challenge for a number of experts. The social dimension of development studies has gained significance in recent decades. Civil society and social capital are, therefore, increasingly more examined as these concepts are widely discussed; and there are not many empirical country specific studies of them. Accordingly, this thesis focuses on local participation and social capital in women’s development projects in Turkey. The research question in this study is: how does internal versus external financing influence local participation in women’s development projects of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in Turkey? In order to examine the role of financing in local participation in women’s development projects, the theoretical arguments focusing on development, civil society, women’s development and social capital are assessed to demonstrate the importance of local participation for sustainable development and women’s development projects for empowerment of women. Furthermore, an overview of Turkey’s history from the angle of civil society and women’s movement is presented to provide a background for the evolution of women’s NGOs and their work in Turkey. A sample of donor organizations and externally and internally funded women’s development projects is selected as cases. The assumption of this study is that local participation can facilitate social capital. Women should be perceived as able and active participants in all phases of the NGOs’ projects, including implementation and monitoring. Thus, NGOs and local donors are expected to use more participatory approaches because of the grounded knowledge potentially stemming from ‘internal’ resources that are embedded in these organizations. However, the research findings demonstrated that this argument cannot be sufficiently supported. Despite the participatory requirement in the iv applications, managers/administration of both externally and internally funded projects perceive no such requirement. Neither the externally nor the internally financed projects were undertaken with considerable local participation. Overall, the findings have shown that the participatory approach is often part of the rhetoric of the donors and the NGOs; however, it rarely appears in practice. Since local participation is not facilitated to a full extent in the sample projects, social capital is not used to allow empowerment of women as active owners of their choice of development programs. Therefore, bonding and bridging social capital among women in Turkey requires further research. Consequently, it is puzzling that development practitioners in Turkey dealing with women/gender in development would not fully utilize this invaluable resource.