Criticisms of social capital theory: and lessons for improving practice

Social capital has been perceived as a miracle concept that is able to provide answers to a range of phenomenon beyond an economic lens (Poder 2011). Its rapid and wide application has made it one of the most popular concepts in the social sciences yet people using the term do not always mean the same thing. Social capital is ill-defined, with different authors attributing different meanings to the concept (Durlauf 1999). Scratch beneath the surface of social capital and things get complicated rather quickly (Lynch et al. 2000). Social capital is so complicated that entire books are devoted to exploring the conceptual and theoretical underpinnings. I have personally spent many hours, or even days, weeks, and months, analysing and synthesising the seemingly disparate literature on social capital in an attempt to gain a coherent understanding of the concept. This has been a gargantuan task over many years that has been regularly marked by moments of exasperation at the crass scholarship and caviller application of the concept. Social capital is far from a unified theory; there is little agreement about definition, dimensions, measurement, or building.