Social Capital: A complex of dynamic relationships

Landscape management negotiates across interlinked ecological and social systems drawing on social resources in situations where issues in landscape sustainability challenge society’s capacity and will in problem solving. Social capital results from a dynamic process that operates through social networks based on norms of reciprocity that ensue through practices of exchange and depend on relations of trust. While social capital is frequently referred to as the glue that holds society together (World Bank 1998, Stone and Hughes 2002 Productivity Commission 2003) this research makes use of a complex systems framework to identify the content of social capital. Social networks and the coupling forms (Marion 1999) through which individuals, communities and society are linked serve as evidence to expose a process that reflects innovation, adoption, consolidation and stagnation followed by cyclic renewal through innovation (Holling 2001). This paper outlines the theoretical basis of social capital as a means of exploring the potential for a re-framing within complex systems framework. An explorative research methodology integrated results from comparative agri-ecological landscapes through quantitative survey and qualitative interview methods. The results provided a re-configuration of social capital as a dynamic force that exposes the interaction between bridging and bonding social capital. It is this dynamic relationship that exposes the adaptive capacity which maintains resilience in socio-ecological communities. These results make explicit the dynamic characteristics of social capital that act as a key component of resilience in agricultural landscapes