Challenging Robert Putnam: how do we create a just society as well as a participatory one?

Challenging Robert Putnam: how do we create a just society as well as a participatory one? Diverse Communities: The Problem with Social Capital Barbara ArneilCambridge University Press Cambridge University Press (known colloquially as CUP) is a publisher given a Royal Charter by Henry VIII in 1534, and one of the two privileged presses (the other being Oxford University Press). 267 pages ISBN ISBNabbr.International Standard Book NumberISBNInternational Standard Book NumberISBNn abbr (= International Standard Book Number) → ISBN m9780521857192, hardcover ISBN9780521673907, softcover soft��cov��er?adj.Not bound between hard covers: softcover books; a softcover edition. The publication in 2000 of Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revivalof American Community elevated its author, Robert Putnam Robert David Putnam (born 1941 in Rochester, New York) is a political scientist and professor at Harvard University. Putnam developed the influential two-level game theory that assumes international agreements will only be successfully brokered if they also result in domestic , to the statusof guru of social capital. He defined social capital as the"connections among individuals--social networks and the norms ofreciprocity reciprocityIn international trade, the granting of mutual concessions on tariffs, quotas, or other commercial restrictions. Reciprocity implies that these concessions are neither intended nor expected to be generalized to other countries with which the contracting parties and trustworthiness trustworthinessEthics A principle in which a person both deserves the trust of others and does not violate that trust that rise from them." The speedwith which this concept gained traction among development theorists andcommunity activists testifies to its apparent utility. For those workingin developing societies, frustrated frus��trate?tr.v. frus��trat��ed, frus��trat��ing, frus��trates1. a. To prevent from accomplishing a purpose or fulfilling a desire; thwart: by the failure of conventionaleconomic approaches, it seemed to explain weak public institutions,non-functioning markets and failed states. It helped to justify the newfocus on governance and institution-building; it even gave socialscientists at the World Bank and elsewhere a way to quantify socialphenomena and so wrest wrest?tr.v. wrest��ed, wrest��ing, wrests1. To obtain by or as if by pulling with violent twisting movements: wrested the book out of his hands; wrested the islands from the settlers. back some legitimacy from the economists. Putnam viewed social capital as the glue binding societiestogether: it creates more connections or participation by individuals informal and informal groups, and builds greater trust, which, in turn,leads to engaged citizens, smoothly functioning markets and responsivegovernments. In his words, "civic connections help make us healthy,wealthy, and wise." Intuitively, this makes sense: we all know howthe "old boys club" facilitates access and reinforcesprivilege. Given the important contribution social capital makes to economicprosperity and civic cohesion, there was every reason to be alarmed bythe conclusion Putnam drew from his extensive research, namely thatsince the 1960s there has been a steady erosion of social capital in theUnited States United States,officially United States of America, republic (2005 est. pop. 295,734,000), 3,539,227 sq mi (9,166,598 sq km), North America. The United States is the world's third largest country in population and the fourth largest country in area. . Americans, Putnam concluded, are no longer joining butare instead opting to go "bowling alone." Not surprisingly,his analysis, conclusions and prescriptions set off a noisy debate. Somecritics argued that his findings were flawed because he was tracking thewrong indicators: Americans hadn't stopped joining; they were justchoosing to get involved in different kinds of organizations. Othersquestioned whether you can gauge the amount of social capital possessedby communities or groups simply by aggregating the number of individualrelationships. A new book by University of British Columbia LocationsVancouverThe Vancouver campus is located at Point Grey, a twenty-minute drive from downtown Vancouver. It is near several beaches and has views of the North Shore mountains. The 7. scholar and politicalscientist Barbara Arneil titled Diverse Communities: The Problem withSocial Capital is the latest contribution to this debate. Arneil notonly questions Putnam's data and conclusions; she also lays barethe assumptions underlying his whole concept of social capital andcounters his implicit (and at times explicit) aim of recreating aunited, cohesive American community with the higher value she places onbuilding a more just and inclusive society. For Arneil, social capitalis not neutral, nor does it have only positive outcomes. Like othersocial capital theorists, such as Pierre Bourdieu Pierre Bourdieu (August 1, 1930– January 23, 2002) was an acclaimed French sociologist whose work employed methods drawn from a wide range of disciplines: from philosophy and literary theory to sociology and anthropology. , she sees it asanother means for the powerful to protect their interests. Where Putnaminvokes an earlier connected, unified American society of shared values,she sees a country in which white males preserved their privilegesthrough associations that excluded women, African Americans African AmericanMulticulture A person having origins in any of the black racial groups of Africa.See Race. and othersoutside the mainstream culture. Arneil's critique of Putnam's view of social capitalfocuses on the following issues: first, that Putnam's instrumentalview of social capital as contributing to a shared culture ignores theextent to which civil society itself is an arena of competing values.Looked at through the lens of gender and culture, the "common"values and norms either excluded women and minorities or saw them asgroups to be assimilated. Second, in her view his explanations for thedecline (such as the arrival of mass television and the entry of womeninto the workforce) are incomplete or faulty. Third, she maintains thatPutnam conflates participation and trust, whereas these are two quitedifferent phenomena that should be analyzed separately. This latter point is particularly important. For Putnam,participation in groups and networks leads to a generalized trust inothers, and this in turn creates social cohesion and a host of otherpositive outcomes, both for individuals and the wider society. ForArneil, on the other hand, participation and trust are separate. Shedemonstrates that while the level of participation has changed overtime, there has been a general decline in trust over the past 30 yearsand a wide and persistent gap in the levels of trust experienced byprivileged and marginalized groups. The decline is viewed as an entirelyreasonable response to a sense of betrayal resulting from dashed hopesand disappointed expectations. Deliberate duplicity DUPLICITY, pleading. Duplicity of pleading consists in multiplicity of distinct matter to one and the same thing, whereunto several answers are required. Duplicity may occur in one and the same pleading. by government fromthe time of the Vietnam war Vietnam War,conflict in Southeast Asia, primarily fought in South Vietnam between government forces aided by the United States and guerrilla forces aided by North Vietnam. to the present Bush administration, thefailure of the war on poverty and the civil rights struggle to achievelasting results, evidence of corporate malfeasance The commission of an act that is unequivocally illegal or completely wrongful.Malfeasance is a comprehensive term used in both civil and Criminal Law to describe any act that is wrongful. , and so on, haveundermined Americans' confidence in their institutions. The gapamong groups' level of trust, however, is attributed by her and byother research to persistent and growing economic inequality For the economic inequality among nations, see international inequality.Economic inequality refers to disparities in the distribution of economic assets and income. . The implications for policy makers and social activists are clear.The challenge is not just to find ways to encourage participation inbowling leagues and volunteer activities but to go deeper into causes,into how a sense of security and hope are instilled through family andearly childhood experiences, and into the corrosive corrosive/cor��ro��sive/ (kor-o��siv) producing gradual destruction, as of a metal by electrochemical reaction or of the tissues by the action of a strong acid or alkali; an agent that so acts. effect of economicinequality. Rather than seeing social capital as a latent resource thatcan be mobilized by even the most marginalized groups, it turns out thattrust, too, is a function of socioeconomic privilege. The task is not toinduce people to interact more, but to create a society that justifiestheir trust by being open, just and respectful of different values andidentities, a society that includes them. Whereas Putnam concludes that the loss of social capital has manypotentially negative consequences for America, and that there is a needtherefore for explicit measures to increase it based on a set of sharednorms, Arneil sees the recent past as a hopeful period during which manyformerly excluded groups fought to have their values and existencerecognized by the larger society. It has been, and remains, a divisivebut necessary struggle for any society that aspires to be just andinclusive. It is not just governments that have been seduced by the idea thatgreater "civic engagement" is the solution to many of oursociety's ills. Funders and community development agencies havealso focused on encouraging participation. They make an implicitdistinction between "good" and "bad" social capital(since the Hell's Angels Hell's Angelsnpl → Hell's Angels pland street gangs are forms of bonding asmuch as Rotary and parent-teacher associations parent-teacher associationNounan organization consisting of the parents and teachers of school pupils formed to organize activities on behalf of the school ). Social capital theorydistinguishes between bonding and bridging social capital; poorcommunities often have the former, strong intra-group ties, but areisolated and relatively powerless. They are said to be in need ofbridging social capital that will connect them to outside networks andsources of ideas and influence. The missing piece in this appears to bethe issue of power and the differential between groups or classes, whichsets the terms of relationships and determines who will derive the mostbenefit. Gated housing communities, for example, are usually highlyhomogenous homogenous - homogeneous and see their isolation as a way to protect their wealth. Onemight conclude that bridging social capital is only needed by thepowerless, to connect them to outside sources of power. Groups that have faced discrimination, including First Nationspeople, immigrants, people with disabilities, sexual minorities andothers, need both kinds of social capital to balance theirdistinctiveness and their integration into mainstream society. ThomasHomer-Dixon Thomas Homer-Dixon (born 1956 in Victoria, British Columbia) holds the George Ignatieff Chair of Peace and Conflict Studies at the Trudeau Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of Toronto, and is a Professor of Political Science at the University of Toronto. , in The Upside of Down: Catastrophe, Creativity and theRenewal of Civilization, suggests that too much connectedness may reduceresilience by binding people too closely together; on the other hand, amulticultural society accepts the value of diversity and the desire ofpeople to retain their identities. The difference between Putnam and Arneil is the expression offundamentally different views of civic society: either a community ofshared values, of people coming together and developing trust in othersthrough their formal and informal connections, or an arena in whichcultural minorities and the marginalized conduct an ongoing struggle forrecognition and inclusion as citizens in the fullest sense. Putnam's concerns have so far proven the more politicallypotent. Particularly since 9/11, the United States has emphasized theneed for Americans to stand fast against the "enemy." Thecolour-coded security alerts, the Bush administration's"faith-based initiative," which sees fundamentalist fundamentalistAn investor who selects securities to buy and sell on the basis of fundamental analysis. Compare technician. churchesas a transmission belt for society's core values, the use ofNeighborhood Watch to keep an eye on to watch.- Shak.See also: Eye strangers, the vituperation of talkradio--these must all accelerate the erosion of social capital. Policy makers in Europe, too, are looking to engagement to overcomethe disaffection of excluded immigrant youth. In some countries there iswidespread unease as immigrant communities assert their own cultural orreligious values and show no interest in becoming "European."One response has been the proposal that immigrants should sign acontract signifying acceptance of the "core" values of thehost society or be refused entry. In less culturally monolithic Canadait is difficult to state what such a contract might include. Comprisingmany sizeable minority groups, civil society here truly is a space forcontinuous negotiation, as has been seen in the debate over same-sexmarriage Noun 1. same-sex marriage - two people of the same sex who live together as a family; "the legal status of same-sex marriages has been hotly debated"couple, twosome, duet, duo - a pair who associate with one another; "the engaged couple"; "an inseparable , the display of religious symbols, dress and so on. In Quebec, this negotiation has recently taken the form of a publicdebate centred on the notion of "reasonable accommodation Reasonable accommodation is a legal term used in Canada, which is the legal obligation to modify a law or a norm when it is contrary to fundamental rights stipulated in Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. ."The small town of H,rouxville's proclamation in February of a setof values to which newcomers must subscribe was picked up by the mediaand quickly amplified by political leaders. It led to the provincialgovernment's appointment of a committee led by philosopher CharlesTaylor Charlie and Chuck are common familiar or shortened forms for Charles.Charles Taylor may refer to: Political figuresCharles G. and sociologist G,rard Bouchard to provide a forum to air theseissues (and prevent them from getting out of hand). The terms of debateso far have placed the onus on newcomers to adapt to host communitynorms, along the lines of what Putnam has propounded in the UnitedStates. Reasonable accommodation is presented as the minimum effortrequired by the community to show tolerance of strangers, far removedfrom an active embrace of diversity. But reasonable accommodation cuts both ways. Creating socialcapital by encouraging active citizenship Active citizenship generally refers to a philosophy espoused by some organizations and educational institutions. It often states that members of companies or nation-states have certain roles and responsibilities to society and the environment, although those members may not have requires both a disposition byindividuals to engage with their fellows and an openness on the part ofpublic institutions and the wider society to welcome them. This is whereCanada is falling short. The inability of foreign-trained professionalsto have their credentials recognized and to find suitable jobs resultsin a massive waste of talent in areas where Canada is desperately shortof skills. It is easy to see how the promise of opportunity andinclusion that attracted people to come here can turn to anger andfrustration. Furthermore, there is growing evidence thatsecond-generation Canadians, the children of immigrants, are fallingbehind in their levels of employment and income. For First Nationspeople the sense of betrayal of the sort referred to by Arneil in theU.S. has roots in long historical experience that is both collective andpersonal. Canadians' trust in their governments and public institutionshas taken a hit in recent years, although it is perhaps not soprofoundly negative as in the United States. Polls reveal a consistentlylow level of trust in politicians and the bureaucracy, but this does notnecessarily carry over into a loss of what Arneil calls civic trust,that is, trust in people we don't know Don't know (DK, DKed)"Don't know the trade." A Street expression used whenever one party lacks knowledge of a trade or receives conflicting instructions from the other party. . The last chapter of DiverseCommunities lays out the principles for the establishment of a justcommunity in the U.S., which could equally apply in Canada. Government,civil society and citizens all have a role to play in strengtheningcommunity but the strategies for promoting participation and forbuilding civic trust and trust in government are different. Creatingforums for collaboration between the business, public and not-for-profitor community sectors is critical, as are improving educationalattainment Educational attainment is a term commonly used by statisticans to refer to the highest degree of education an individual has completed.[1]The US Census Bureau Glossary defines educational attainment as "the highest level of education completed in terms of the and addressing the specific barriers faced by women andminority groups. Putnam's narrative of the decline of socialcapital in the U.S. and the need to fix it was appealinglystraightforward and it struck a strong chord. Arneil's much morecomplex and exacting challenge to us in Diverse Communities is to builda just society in which everyone truly belongs and everyone can fullyparticipate and flourish. Tim Brodhead is president of The J.W. McConnell Family Foundationand previously worked in the field of international development withseveral non-governmental organizations “NGO” redirects here. For other uses, see NGO (disambiguation).A non-governmental organization (NGO) is a legally constituted organization created by private persons or organizations with no participation or representation of any government. .