Elgar Advanced Introductions are stimulating and thoughtful introductions to major fields in the social sciences, business and law, expertly written by the world's leading scholars. Designed to be accessible yet rigorous, they offer concise and lucid surveys of the substantive and policy issues associated with discrete subject areas. This Advanced Introduction to Social Capital provides an overview of cutting-edge research on social capital. Karen Cook highlights the networks, norms and trust involved in social capital that facilitate cooperation, strengthen civil society and contribute to social order, indicating how each contributes to the collective good and provides resources of value to individuals, organizations and institutions. Key Features: Cross-cultural comparisons of the role of social networks in a number of domains of activity A critical focus on the importance of tolerance and the reaffirmation of democratic principles and practices An understanding of current social and political challenges related to polarization, such as inequality and trust limitations This timely Advanced Introduction is crucial reading for students and researchers in sociology and political science who are looking for an overview of social capital. It will also be an inspiring read for scholars of public policy, particularly those concerned with public management and its impact on social capital.

This Advanced Introduction to Social Capital provides an overview of cutting-edge research on social capital. Karen S. Cook highlights the networks, norms and trust involved in social capital that facilitate cooperation, strengthen civil society and contribute to social order, indicating how each contributes to the collective good and provides resources of value to individuals, organizations and institutions.

This will be a tremendous addition to the social capital literature and especially teaching some of the concepts of social capital at the graduate level. Such a text is badly needed and quite remarkable that no one has published it before. Viva Ona Bartkus, University of Notre Dame, US Social network analysis was, until recently, a relatively unknown branch of sociology and anthropology. The development of menu-driven computer software packages has opened up access for a wide range of audiences, including business and human resource managers. Yet, the tools themselves are of little value without an understanding of the concepts that can relate the computed measures to relevant applications. Social capital provides a framework for relating the abstract world of graph theory, which underlies network analysis, to the concrete world of human behavior. This book teaches how to understand and manage social capital to facilitate individual and organizational learning and goal attainment. Coverage includes both orchestrating relationships of others and navigating one s own social interactions. Written at an introductory level and accessible to those without background in network analysis or graph theory, this text combines both comprehensive analysis and concrete concepts to emphasize how critical a role social capital s applications play on the foundations of business as we know it today. A reference book for practice and academia, this book will appeal to graduate and undergraduate students of business, business executives and all those concerned with cultivating and refining an understanding of social capital.

Social Capital, the advantage created by location in social structure, is a critical element in business strategy. Who has it, how it works, and how to develop it have become key questions as markets, organizations, and careers become more and more dependent on informal, discretionary relationships. The formal organization deals with accountability; Everything else flows through the informal: advice, coordination, cooperation friendship, gossip, knowledge, trust. Informal relations have always been with us, they have always mattered. What is new is the range of activities in which they now matter, and the emerging clarity we have about how they create advantage for certain people at the expense of others. This is done by brokerage and closure. Ronald S. Burt builds upon his celebrated work in this area to explore the nature of brokerage and closure. Brokerage is the activity of people who live at the intersection of social worlds, who have a vision advantage of seeing and developing good ideas, an advantage which can be seen in their compensation, recognition, and the responsibility they're entrusted with in comparison to their peers. Closure is the tightening of coordination in a closed network of people, and people who do this do well as a complement to brokers because of the trust and alignment they create. Brokerage and Closure explores how these elements work together to define social capital, showing how in the business world reputation has come to replace authority, pursued opportunity assignment, and reward has come to be associated with achieving competitive advantage in a social order of continuous disequilibrium.

Sherman Folland and Eric Nauenberg present the cutting-edge of research covering the ever-expanding social capital field. With excellent contributions from leading academics, the Elgar Companion to Social Capital and Health offers a developed examination of new research across sociology, epidemiology, economics, psychology and political science. Authors from across North America, Europe and Asia provide wide-ranging and detailed accounts of social capital and health, focusing on social networks, causality and productivity. Sections cover theoretical perspectives and empirical evidence supporting the connection between social capital and health worldwide. Authors discuss ageing, immigration, religion and workplace health, as well as focusing on social capital in developing countries experiencing rapid and extensive economic growth. Essential reading for any aspirational social capital and health policy academic, this Companion offers future paths for research within sociology, health economics, epidemiology, political science and social policy. The breadth of study would also benefit public health officials, policy analysts and healthcare decision-makers. Contributors include: S.R. Ali, N.D. Anderson, S. Child, H. Corman, S. Dinda, S. Folland, C. Frazier, J. Guo, M.K. Islam, T. Iversen, F. Jusot, O. Kaarbøe, M. Lindström, M. Ljunge, J. Mandelbaum, M. Menéndez, S. Moore, E. Nauenberg, K. Noonan, P.J. Pettis, N.E. Reichman, L. Rocco, L. Rochaix, E. Shapiro, C. Sharony, T.W. Someno, L. Song, Y.-H. Wu

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