Social Capital and Education Systems:An Introduction of Robert D. Putnum\u27s Paper on the Correlation between Community-based Social Capital and Educational Performance

This paper offers a preliminary analysis of social capital in an education system. The concept of social capital is now very attractive to social scientists such as political scientists and educational researchers,but its conceptual framework is unclear and even controversial. According to James Coleman\u27s theory of social capital,I have conceptualized it as a property of the relational ties among individuals within a social system. Social capital is,therefore,embodied in three different forms:social networks,trust among individuals,and norms of reciprocity. In order to study the role of social capital in educational performance,I introduce the issues that Robert D.Putnum emphasized in his paper entitled "Commmunity-based Social Capital and Educational Performance" in Ravitch,Diane & J.viteritt eds.,Making Good Citizens,Yale University Press,2001. Putnum is,of course,a famous political scientist and also a leading scholar of social capital. He especially insists on the effects of community-based social capital on educational performance like standardized test scores. He implies that social capital within a local community is more influencial on the outcomes of schooling than any other factors such as family income or racial composition. He also predicts tha community-based social capital is a more effective factor than family-based social capital or the social capital within a school. Contents: 1.Growing attention on social capital in education 2.Some trends and conceptual frameworks of social capital 3.The issues and method of Putnum\u27s paper 4.Empirical evidence of the effect of community-based social capita