Since the worldwide pandemic, social disorder and poverty have sharply increased. Here is a for the world to return:

When Social Capital Is Low

Since the 1920’s the concept of social capital has been discovered and increasingly understood. First reports of social capital can be traced to the writings of Alexis de Tocqueville, a scholar from France that traveled and wrote about the United States in the early 1800’s. Government in America was radically different from Europe. There and in the United States before the American Revolution, societies had relatively low rates of social change and one’s status in the society was determined by one’s family not one’s achievements.

The world in the 1800’s viewed America as a radical social experiment where all persons were created equal and one’s status in life was determined by one’s efforts. Being equal became a path of conflict and attainment for the years to come, but the departure began in 1776 and 1791. De Tocqueville noted that one of the defining characteristics of the America he visited was the presence in community after community of open meetings that discussed problems and arrived at resolutions. Rather than looking to the tradition of royalty or the Church for direction, he found these informal meetings as one of the defining characteristics of democracy in America and made our country distinct. A hundred years later in 1919 L.J. Hanifan, in a state role of working with public school systems in West Virginia first used the term social capital noting the importance and ubiquity of neighbors working together to create and maintain public school systems.ⁱ

Robert Putnam in 2000 elevated attention to social capital as well as physical and human capital, all together determinants of the wealth of a community. Physical capital refers to the natural and man-created capital including productive land, minerals, roads, utilities, coasts, ports and other physical features that support life and social activity. Human capital is the educational level of a community. Social capital is the level of trust and reciprocity in the community. A community that has high social capital will have low levels of crime, few people unconnected with others and considerable interaction among neighbors, employees, all citizens. A classic measure of social capital is dropping a wallet in a library, grocery store and measuring the rate to which the wallet is returned. Communities with high social capital have high return rates of the dropped wallets!

Social Capital in the Pandemic

Since March of 2020, our country has probably seen one of the greatest declines in social capital in at least the last hundred years. The cause of the decline has been fear of becoming infected from a virus from another person. Public health and medical officials have said that everyone should avoid being in public situations, and, when in such situations, to maintain at least 6 feet from another person and wear a facial mask. Governments have taken such warnings and made them laws ending public assemblies and closing sporting events, restaurants, bars and small retail settings. This decline has had serious economic consequences bankrupting thousands of small businesses, decreasing travel and thus oil consumption and tax revenues. Parents are out of work and trying to assume the tasks of being teachers for their children. Unemployment in 2020 rose to 15%, and even today when one includes discouraged workers that have given up looking for work, real unemployment is probably at 10% or greater.ⁱⁱ

Work, talking with neighbors, people you see on the street and shopping are vehicles of social capital. Attending school and college is the next largest venue of social capital activity. With all these venues closed or sharply reduced, the level of opportunities to create social capital has been sharply reduced.

Low social capital means more poverty, homelessness, mental illness, increased crime. One measure is homicides, the measure of crime that is the least underreported. Violent crimes may be a response to sharp declines in social capital and examples in March include the murders of 8 persons in Atlanta and 10 in Boulder. While both of the murderers appear to be very anti-social persons, high social capital acts as a control as well as a socializing element for all persons. High levels of social capital make people feel more secure and less alone and thus alienated. Nations with high levels of social capital such as the Scandinavian countries, Canada, Japan have lower crime including murder rates.

An important effort during much of 2020 and continuing today is efforts for lessening the rate of infection and hospitalization from the Covid19 virus. But now it is clear that increasing social capital is just as critical. The wealth and healthfulness of every community is based on these three sources of capital. It is social capital that has experienced the greatest decline since March of 2020.

Texas State Agencies and Colleges have long served the citizens of the state through their programs but also as vehicles to build social capital. Agencies use websites to ask citizens how their services are and agency personnel are active in civic organizations where they live as well as their careers. These efforts build social capital. With the sharp decline in social capital in the last 24 months, restoring social capital will start to make all citizens safer and will engage the process to create better lives for all.