1 ‘Individual ’ Social Capital, ‘Social ’ Networks, and their Linkages to Economic Game

on social capital based on a years-long project of the World Bank (Dasgupta and Serageldin 1999). I start out this essay by re-visiting the book. Essays included in that volume exhibited so much varied views on the concept and ways it is used, and, in spite of the lucidly executed concluding chapter by Dasgupta that impartially summarized the contents as well as presented his own comprehensive view, the divide on the concept did not seem to have been settled yet. Particularly troublesome is the fact that the two giants among contemporary economists, Kenneth Arrow and Robert Solow, raised clear objections to the concept of social capital. Arrow “urge[d] the abandonment of the metaphor of capital and the term “social capital.” ” Solow concurred in being “critical of the concept of social capital and the way it is used. ” What were reasons for objections? Arrow, while admitting the plausibility of the hypothesis that social network could affect economic performance, pointed out that “the reward for social interactions is intrinsic” and lacked the important property of capital as saved for future benefit at deliberate sacrifice today. Solow argued that various things normally referred to as social capital, such as “trust, the willingness to cooperate and coordinate, the habit of contributing to