Social Capital –A Dynamic View

Abstract

We argue for the need to adopt a dynamic approach towards the understanding of social capital that can provide insights on how social capital can be leveraged as a response to shifting contextual exigencies. Our paper offers a unifying typology of social capital along four dimensions – autonomous, constrained, formative and normative. We develop the following four views of social capital – normative-constrained, normative-autonomous, formative-constrained, formative-autonomous. Furthermore, we draw on an empirical study in an agricultural cooperative to illustrate these four views and the varying sources of social capital manifested therein. It is this variation in use that undergirds our understanding of a dynamic conception of social capital.