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Social exclusion and social capital: A comparison and critique

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Abstract

Social exclusion and social capital are widely used concepts with multiple and ambiguous definitions. Their meanings and indicators partially overlap, and thus they are sometimes used interchangeably to refer to the inter-relations of economy and society. Both ideas could benefit from further specification and differentiation. The causes of social exclusion and the consequences of social capital have received the fullest elaboration, to the relative neglect of the outcomes of social exclusion and the genesis of social capital. This article identifies the similarities and differences between social exclusion and social capital. We compare the intellectual histories and theoretical orientations of each term, their empirical manifestations and their place in public policy. The article then moves on to elucidate further each set of ideas. A central argument is that the conflation of these notions partly emerges from a shared theoretical tradition, but also from insufficient theorizing of the processes in which each phenomenon is implicated. A number of suggestions are made for sharpening their explanatory focus, in particular better differentiating between cause and consequence, contextualizing social relations and social networks, and subjecting the policy ‘solutions’ that follow from each perspective to critical scrutiny. Placing the two in dialogue is beneficial for the further development of each.

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  1. The term depicts an approach dominant in the discourse and policies of Washington-based international financial institutions in the 1980s, which advocated for crisis-ridden economies a reform package of trade and financial liberalization, deregulation, privatization of state enterprises, reduction in public spending, and macroeconomic adjustment. The term developed especially to highlight a move away from the interventionist approach advocated by the World Bank under Robert McNamara. See Ben Fine, Social Capital versus Social Theory: Political Economy and Social Science at the Turn of the Millenium (London: Routledge, 2001). See also Francis Fukuyama, “Social capital and development: the coming agenda,” SAIS Review XX11/1 (Winter-Spring 2002): 23–37.

  2. Charles Kadushin, “Too much investment in social capital?” Social Networks 26/1 (2004): 77.

  3. Hilary Silver, “Social exclusion and social solidarity: Three paradigms,” International Labour Review 133/5–6 (1994): 536.

  4. We recognize that comparing and contrasting the two concepts carries the risk of representing them as if each were singly conceptualized. It is obvious to us that they are not. We endeavor throughout to treat the two concepts as differentiated, but for the kind of comparative exercise that is undertaken, it is necessary to focus on the broad themes and general tendencies in the literature taken as a whole.

  5. Silver (1994) elaborates social exclusion in terms of three paradigms. In the first, French Republican tradition of solidarisme, social exclusion is the expression of a rupture in the social bond (lien social) between the individual and society. The second paradigm, which is situated in the individualist frame of Anglo-American liberalism and which Silver names “specialization,” sees exclusion as occurring when people lack access to economic and social exchanges. In the third approach–termed the “monopoly paradigm”–social exclusion occurs because insiders earn rents by excluding outsiders. The solidarity paradigm locates social exclusion in the failure of integrating processes, especially the cultural and moral infrastructure and group solidarity. In the specialization view, discrimination or group distinctions prevent people from exercising their choices as regards exchanges and social interactions. In the monopoly paradigm, social exclusion results from social closure through the monopolization of key resources by powerful interest groups and the interplay of class, status, and political power.

  6. Alison Woodward and Martin Kohli, “European societies: Inclusions/exclusions?” in Alison Woodward and Martin Kohli, editors, Inclusions and Exclusions in European Society (London: Routledge, 2001), 2.

  7. Jean-Francois Ravaud and Henri-Jacques Stiker, “Inclusion/exclusion: An analysis of historical and cultural meanings,” in Gary Albrecht, Katherine D. Seelman, and Michael Bury, editors, Handbook of Disability (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2001).

  8. Graham Room, “Poverty in Europe: Competing paradigms of analysis,” Policy and Politics 23/2 (1995): 103–114.

  9. See Nan Lin, Social Capital: A Theory of Social Structure and Action (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001). Coleman argues that “social capital inheres in the structure of relations between persons and among persons. It is neither lodged in individuals nor in physical implements of production.” J Coleman, “Social capital in the creation of human capital,” American Journal of Sociology 94 (1988): 100. Putnam also holds that social capital is found in “the features of social organization, such as networks, norms and social trust, that facilitate coordination and cooperation for mutual benefit.” Robert Putnam, “Bowling alone: America’s declining social capital,” Journal of Democracy 6 (1995): 67. See also Putnam, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2000).

  10. Paul Lichterman, “Social capital or group style? Rescuing Tocqueville’s insights on civic engagement,” Theory and Society 35/5–6 (2006): 529–563; Bob Edwards, Michael Foley, and Mario Diani, editors. Beyond Tocqueville: Civil Society and the Social Capital Debate in Comparative Perspective (Medford, MA: Tufts University Press, 2001).

  11. Pierre Bourdieu, “The forms of capital,” in John. G. Richardson, editor, Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education (Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1986).

  12. Gunnar Lind Haase Svendsen and Gert Tinggaard Svendsen, “On the wealth of nations: Bourdieuconomics and social capital,” Theory and Society 32/4 (2003): 607–631.

  13. Serge Paugam, La disqualification sociale. Essai sur la nouvelle pauvreté (Paris: Presses Universitaires Francaises, 1991).

  14. Robert Putnam, Making Democracy Work (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993), 177.

  15. Some even define social exclusion as a “lack of social capital,” and consider greater participation in community to be an “antidote to social exclusion.” Janie Percy-Smith, Policy Responses to Social Exclusion (Buckingham: Open University Press, 2000), 6.

  16. Tom Schuller, Stephen Baron, and John Field, “Social capital: A review and critique,” in Stephen Baron, John Field, and Tom Schuller, editors, Social Capital: Critical Perspectives (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 13.

  17. It is important to note that social exclusion had appeared in EU discourse for at least 10 years before the Lisbon agreement. See Mary Daly, “EU social policy after Lisbon,” Journal of Common Market Studies 44/3 (2006): 461–481.

  18. See David Halpern, Social Capital (Cambridge: Polity Press 2005); see also Marc Hooghe and Dietlind Stolle, editors, Generating Social Capital: Civil Society and Institutions in Comparative Perspective (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003).

  19. European Commission, Social Inclusion in Europe 2006—Implementation and Update Reports on 2003–2005 National Action Plans on Social Inclusion and Update Reports on 2004–2006 National Action Plans on Social Inclusion (Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, 2006), 33.

  20. Adam Coutts, Pedro Ramos Pinto, Ben Cave, and Ichiro Kawachi, Social Capital Indicators in the UK: A Research Project for the Commission for Racial Equality (London: Ben Cave Associates, 2007).

  21. See H. Silver, “Social exclusion and social solidarity” (1994), and Serge Paugam, “Introduction: La constitution d’un paradigme,” in Serge Paugam, editor, L’exclusion: L’Etat des saviors (Paris: La Découverte, 1996).

  22. Ruth Levitas, The Inclusive Society? Social Exclusion and New Labour (Basingstoke: Palgrave, 1998); Robert Castel, Les metamorphoses de la question social (Paris: Fayard, 1995); S. Paugam, La disqualification sociale. Essai sur la nouvelle pauvreté (1991); David Byrne, Social Exclusion, second edition (Maidenhead, Berks: Open University Press, 2005).

  23. The EU has devoted considerable resources to benchmarking and measurement of social exclusion. This has been a primary task of the Social Protection Committee, the expert body that, consisting of delegates from each member state, serves as a vehicle for cooperative exchange between the European Commission and the member states in regard to modernizing and improving social protection systems. The Committee established an Indicators’ Sub-Group to work on the development of indicators and statistics in support of its tasks. Measurement and monitoring were also prioritized by the Luxembourg Presidency of the European Union during the first six months of 2005. A number of academics were commissioned to write a review, around which a Presidency conference was later convened (on 13–14 June 2005). See Anthony Atkinson, Bea Cantillon, Eric Marlier, and Brian Nolan, Taking Forward the EU Social Inclusion Process (Luxembourg: Ministère de la Familie et de l’Intégration, 2005).

  24. To the extent that Putnam’s communitarianism explicitly draws upon Tocqueville’s civic republicanism, disinterested civic virtue also inhabits social capital discourse. However, Putnam’s apolitical, state-less, and relentlessly positive account of civic engagement misconstrues Tocqueville’s republicanism. On the shortcomings of Putnam’s purported republicanism, see Per Mouritsen, “What’s the civil in civil society? Robert Putnam, Italy, and the republican tradition,” Political Studies 51(2003): 650–668.

  25. P. Bourdieu, “The forms of capital” (1986), 248–249.

  26. Gordon Johnston and Janie Percy-Smith, “In search of social capital,” Policy and Politics 31/3 (2003): 321–334.

  27. Graham Room, “Poverty and social exclusion: The new European agenda for policy and research,” in Graham Room, editor, Beyond the Threshold: The Measurement and Analysis of Social Exclusion (Bristol: The Policy Press, 1995), 5.

  28. See Serge Paugam, “The spiral of precariousness: A multidimensional approach to the process of social disqualification in France,” in Graham Room, editor, Beyond the Threshold: The Measurement and Analysis of Social Exclusion (Bristol: The Policy Press, 1995).

  29. See especially D. Byrne, Social Exclusion (2005).

  30. For the factor analysis across four dimensions (freedom, perceived corruption, civic participation, and generalized trust) in 25 countries, see Gert Svendsen and Christian Bjornskov, “How to construct a robust measure of social capital: Two contributions,” Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis 9/3 (2007): 275–292. For the multiple indicator approach, see Panos Tsakloglou and Fotis Papadopoulos, “Aggregate level and determining factors of social exclusion in twelve European countries,” Journal of European Social Policy 12/3 (2005): 211–225. Those who are deprived on at least 2 of 4 dimensions (income poverty, living conditions, necessities of life, and social relations) at least twice in a period of three years were classified as being at “high risk of social exclusion.” When aggregated to the national level, countries varied from a high rate of social exclusion in Italy, Greece, and the UK to a low rate in Denmark and the Netherlands, corresponding with welfare regime types.

  31. Mark Granovetter, “The strength of weak ties,” American Journal of Sociology 78/4 (1973): 1350–1380.

  32. Trust and civic norms are associated with better economic performance, but membership in formal groups is not associated with trust or improved economic performance. Trust and civic norms are stronger in countries with higher and equal incomes, institutions that restrain predatory elites, and better-educated and ethnically homogeneous populations. Stephen Knack and Philip Keefer, “Does social capital have an economic payoff? A cross-country investigation,” Quarterly Journal of Economics 112/4 (1997): 1251–1288.

  33. P. Mouritsen, “What’s the civil in civil society? Robert Putnam, Italy, and the republican tradition” (2003), 660. Indeed, the Oklahoma City bombers belonged to a bowling league. Margaret Levi, “Social and unsocial capital,” Politics and Society 24/1 (1996): 45–55.

  34. Foley and Edwards note that a functional definition of social capital as “whatever facilitates individual or collective action” makes it “very context-dependent” in that social capital has to have a desired consequence or it is not social capital. Michael W. Foley and Bob Edwards, “Editors’ Introduction Escape from Politics? Social theory and the social capital debate,” American Behavioral Scientist 40/5 (1997): 550–561.

  35. C. Kadushin, “Too much investment in social capital?” (2004).

  36. See James DeFilippis, “The myth of social capital in community development,” Housing Policy Debate 12/4 (2001): 781–806; Margit Mayer, “The onward sweep of social capital: Causes and consequences for understanding cities, communities and urban movements,” International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 27/1 (2003): 110–132.

  37. For example, Tsakloglou and Papadopoulos (2005); Eleni Apospori and Jane Millar, The Dynamics of Social Exclusion in Europe: Comparing Austria, Germany, Greece, Portugal and the UK (Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar, 2003).

  38. Christian Bjornskov, “The multiple facets of social capital,” European Journal of Political Economy 22 (2006): 22–40.

  39. G. Svendsen and C. Bjornskov, “How to construct a robust measure of social capital: Two contributions” (2007).

  40. As B. Fine (Social Capital versus Social Theory, 2001: 63) points out, the literature proceeds by taking a generalized notion of social capital and disaggregating it into specific types (rather than following Bourdieu’s specification of social capital as a particular type of capital). Different types or dimensions of social capital operate differently.

  41. Stephen F. Messner, Eric P. Baumer, and Richard Rosenfeld, “Dimensions of social capital and rates of criminal homicide,” American Sociological Review 69/6 (2004): 882–903.

  42. Claude Fischer, “Bowling Alone: What’s the score?” Social Networks 27/2 (2005): 155–167.

  43. However, the same study also identified “four main, and overlapping, ingredients” in the definition of social capital: “social trust/reciprocity; collective efficacy; participation in voluntary organizations; and social integration for mutual benefit.” A. Coutts et al., Social Capital Indicators in the UK: A Research Project for the Commission for Racial Equality (2007, 5); Roger Patulny and Gunnar Svendsen, “Exploring the social capital grid: Bonding, bridging, qualitative, quantitative,” International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy 27, 1/2 (2007): 32–51.

  44. Yaojun Li, Andrew Pickles and Mike Savage, “Social capital and social trust in Britain,” European Sociological Review 21(2) (2005), 120.

  45. Tania Burchardt, Julian Le Grand, and David Piachaud, “Degrees of exclusion: Developing a dynamic, multidimensional measure,” in John Hills, Julian Le Grand, and David Piachaud, editors, Understanding Social Exclusion (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002).

  46. Matt Barnes, Social Exclusion in Great Britain An Empirical Investigation and Comparison with the EU (Aldershot: Avebury, 2005).

  47. Matt Barnes, Christopher Heady, Sue Middleton, Jane Millar, Graham Room, Fotis Papadopoulos, and Panos Tsakloglou, Poverty and Social Exclusion in Europe (Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 2002).

  48. Graham Room, “Trajectories of social exclusion: The wider context for the third and first worlds,” in David Gordon and Peter Townsend, editors, Breadline Europe The Measurement of Poverty (Bristol: the Policy Press, 2000); S. Paugam, La disqualification sociale. Essai sur la nouvelle pauvreté (1991).

  49. See A. Atkinson et al., Taking Forward the EU Social Inclusion Process (2005).

  50. Jane Jenson, Mapping Social Cohesion: The State of Canadian Research (Ottawa: Strategic Research and Analysis Directorate, Department of Canadian Heritage and Canadian Policy Research Networks, CPRN Study No. F/03, 1998).

  51. See M. Daly, “EU social policy after Lisbon,” (2006). See also Deborah Mabbett, “Learning by numbers? The use of indicators in the coordination of social inclusion policies in Europe,” Journal of European Public Policy 14/1 (2007): 79–96. For an assessment of the impact of the social inclusion process, see Jonathan Zeitlin and Philippe Pochet (with Lars Magnusson), editors, The Open Method of Coordination in Action: The European Employment and Social Inclusion Strategies (Brussels: Peter Lang, 2005).

  52. According to the principle of subsidiarity, which was enshrined in EU law by the Treaty of Maastricht in 1992, the EU may only act (i.e., make laws) where member states agree that action of individual countries is insufficient. The principle serves the functions of, on the one hand, setting up a division of competence between the EU and member states and on the other, endorsing the primacy of the member states in some domains, one of which is social policy. The legal situation in the EU remains that core areas of social policy continue to be governed by subsidiarity and hence require unanimous voting. These include social security and the social protection of workers, the protection of workers when their contract is terminated, the representation and collective defense of interests of workers and employers, the conditions of employment of third-country nationals legally residing in Community territory, and financial contributions for the promotion of employment and job creation.

  53. See Martina Dieckhoff and Duncan Gallie, “The renewed Lisbon Strategy and social exclusion policy,” Industrial Relations Journal 38/6 (2007): 480–502.

  54. For a discussion of the French and UK cases, see Daniel Béland, “The social exclusion discourse: Ideas and policy change,” Policy and Politics 35/1 (2007): 123–39.

  55. See Tine Rossing Feldman and Susan Assaf, Social Capital: Conceptual Frameworks and Empirical Evidence: An Annotated Bibliography (Washington: World Bank Social Development Department, 1999). For the World Bank approach, see also Deepa Narayan (with Raj Patel, Kai Schafft, Anne Rademacher and Sarah Koch-Schulte), Voices of the Poor: Can Anyone Hear Us? (New York: The World Bank and Oxford University Press, 2000), and Michael Woolcock, “Social capital and economic development: Towards a theoretical synthesis and policy framework,” Theory and Society 27 (1998): 151–208. For a strong critique of the World Bank approach, see B. Fine, Social Capital versus Social Theory: Political Economy and Social Science at the Turn of the Millenium (2001).

  56. M. Mayer, “The onward sweep of social capital” (2003: 115) points out the virtual absence of actors such as political institutions, employer organizations, and trade unions from the World Bank’s prescriptions.

  57. M. Mayer, “The onward sweep of social capital” (2003: 122); B. Fine, Social Capital versus Social Theory (2001), 171.

  58. See Susan Saegert, J. Phillip Thompson, and Mark R. Warren, Social Capital in Poor Communities (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 2001).

  59. Bernd Balkenhol, editor, Microfinance and Public Policy: Outreach, Performance, and Efficiency (Geneva: ILO, 2007).

  60. Avis C. Vidal. Rebuilding Communities: A National Study of Urban Community Development Corporations (New York: Community Development Research Center, New School University, 1992); Marilyn Gittell, Limits to Citizen Particpation: The Decline of Community Organizations (Beverly Hills: Sage, 1980); Ronald F. Ferguson and William T. Dickens, editors, Urban Problems and Community Development. (Washington, D.C.: The Brookings Institution, 1999); Randy Stoecker, “The CDC model of urban redevelopment: A critique and an alternative,” Journal of Urban Affairs 19/1 (1997): 1–22, and rejoinders by Rachel Bratt and W. Dennis Keating. CDCs have shifted from advocacy and community organizing to business management, and are run by professionals rather than residents. It is difficult to see these organizations as inclusive schools of deliberative democracy. The staff, funding, and control are all external to the community whose social capital is disparaged when CDCs perform poorly.

  61. M. Mayer, “The onward sweep of social capital” (2003).

  62. For leftist critiques of social exclusion, see Etienne Balibar, “Inegalités, fractionnement social, exclusion: Nouvelles formes de l’antagonisme de classe?” in Joelle Affichard and Jean-Baptiste de Foucauld, editors, Justice Sociale et Inegalités (Paris: Editions Esprit, 1992), and Robert Castel, Les metamorphoses de la question social (1995).

  63. M. Mayer, “The onward sweep of social capital” (2003), gives a very good exposition of social capital’s appeal in this context. See also B. Fine, Social Capital versus Social Theory (2001).

  64. C. Kadushin, “Too much investment in social capital?” (2004), 87.

  65. See, inter alia, C. Kadushin, “Too much investment in social capital?” (2004); M. Mayer, “The onward sweep of social capital” (2003); Alejandro Portes, “‘Social capital’: Its origins and applications in modern sociology,” Annual Review of Sociology 24 (1998): 1–24.

  66. A. Portes, “Social capital” (1998).

  67. See Alejandro Portes and Patricia Landolt, “The downside of social capital,” The American Prospect 7/26 (1996) http://www.prospect.org/web/page.ww?section=root&name=ViewPrint&articleId=4943.

  68. N. Lin, Social Capital (2001).

  69. C. Fischer, “Bowling Alone: What’s the score?” (2005).

  70. See, inter alia, Everett C. Ladd, The Ladd Report (New York: Free Press, 1999); Pamela Paxton, “Is social capital declining in the United States? A multiple indicator assessment,” American Journal of Sociology 105/1 (1999): 88–127; Robert Wuthnow, Loose Connections (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2002).

  71. See A. Portes and P. Landolt, “The downside of social capital” (1996) and also A. Portes, “‘Social capital’: Its origins and applications in modern sociology” (1998).

  72. C. Fischer, “Bowling Alone: What’s the score?” (2005).

  73. Yaojun Li, Mike Savage and Andrew Pickles, “Social capital and social exclusion in England and Wales (1972–1999),” British Journal of Sociology 54/4 (2003): 497–526.

  74. Ibid., 500.

  75. P. Bourdieu, “The forms of capital,” (1986).

  76. Ruth Levitas, “What is social exclusion?” in David Gordon and Peter Townsend, editors, Breadline Europe The Measurement of Poverty (Bristol: Policy Press, 2000), 359.

  77. A. Woodward and M. Kohli, editors, Inclusions and Exclusions in European Society (2001), 3.

  78. A notable exception is Charles Tilly, “Social boundary mechanisms,” Philosophy of the Social Sciences 34/2 (June 2004): 211–236.

  79. Robert E. Goodin, “Inclusion and exclusion,” European Journal of Sociology 37 (1996): 343–371.

  80. A. Woodward and M. Kohli, editors, Inclusions and Exclusions in European Society (2001), 4.

  81. See E. Balibar, “Inegalités, fractionnement social, exclusion” (1992), R. Castel, Les metamorphoses de la question social (1995).

  82. Fairclough reaches this conclusion from an analysis of the linguistic forms of social exclusion (along with other concepts) utilized by the governing New Labour party in the UK in its first years in office. Comparing it to the usage in some EU documents, he notes that in the UK, social exclusion tends to be used adjectivally, whereas the EU was more likely to use it both as a verb and an adjective. See Norman Fairclough, New Labour, New Language (London: Routledge, 2000).

  83. D. Byrne, Social Exclusion (2005), 81.

  84. John Veit-Wilson, Setting Adequacy Standards (Bristol: The Policy Press, 1998).

  85. John Goldthorpe, “Globalization and social classes,” West European Politics 25/3 (July 2002): 1–28.

  86. P. Mouritsen, “What’s the civil in civil society?” (2003).

  87. Martin Paldam and Gert Svendsen, “An essay on social capital: Looking for the fire behind the smoke,” European Journal of Political Economy 16/2 (2000): 339–366.

  88. Hilary Silver, The Process of Social Exclusion: The Dynamics of an Evolving Concept (Chronic Poverty Research Centre, Working Paper 95, Manchester, October 2007).

  89. See, inter alia, D. Byrne, Social Exclusion (2005).

  90. Serge Paugam, “Poverty and social exclusion: A sociological view,” in Martin Rhodes and Yves Mény, editors, The Future of European Welfare A New Social Contract? (Basingstoke, UK: Macmillan, 1998), 43.

  91. On the life course, see Karl Ulrich Mayer, “The paradox of global social change and national path dependencies: Life course patterns in advanced societies,” in Alison Woodward and Martin Kohli, editors, Inclusions and Exclusions in European Society (London: Routledge, 2001): 90–110; Glen Elder and Michael Shanahan, “The life course and human development,” in William Damon and Richard Lerner, editors, Handbook of Child Psychology, vol. 1, 6 th ed: Theoretical Models of Human Development (New York: Wiley and Stone, 2006), 665–715.

  92. Maria Patricia Fernandez-Kelly, “Social and cultural capital in the urban ghetto: Implications for the economic sociology of immigration,” in Alejandro Portes, editor, The Economic Sociology of Immigration (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1995), 213–47.

  93. Cecilia Menjivar, Fragmented Ties: Salvadoran Immigrant Networks in America (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000), 155, 231.

  94. C. Bjornskov, “The multiple facets of social capital” (2006).

  95. C. Fischer, “Bowling Alone: What’s the score?” (2005).

  96. A. Coutts et al., Social Capital Indicators in the UK: A Research Project for the Commission for Racial Equality (2007). The 2001 Social Capital Community Benchmark Survey collected network data in a wide range of American communities.

  97. Roger Waldinger, Still the Promised City? African Americans and New Immigrants in Post-Industrial New York (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1996); Roger Waldinger and Michael Lichter, How the Other Half Works (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003).

  98. C.Menjivar, Fragmented Ties (2000), 31, 34.

  99. M. Fernandez-Kelly, “Social and cultural capital in the urban ghetto” (1995).

  100. Cynthia Cranford, “Networks of exploitation,” Social Problems 52/3 (2005): 379–97; Victor Nee, Jimy Sanders, and Scott Sernau, “Job transitions in an immigrant metropolis,” American Sociological Review 59/6 (1994): 849–72.

  101. Jimy Sanders and Victor Nee, “Immigrant self-employment: The family as social capital and the value of human capital,” American Sociological Review 61 (1996): 231–249; Alejandro Portes and Leif Jensen, “Disproving the enclave hypothesis: Reply,” American Sociological Review 57/3 (1992): 418–420.

  102. C. Cranford, “Networks of exploitation,” (2005), 393, 395.

  103. On social closure, see Raymond Murphy, Social Closure: The Theory of Monopolization and Exclusion (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988); Frank Parkin, Marxism and Class Theory: A Bourgeois Critique (New York: Columbia University Press, 1979); Charles Tilly, Durable Inequality (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998).

  104. F. Parkin, Marxism and Class Theory (1979); R. Murphy, Social Closure (1988); C. Tilly, Durable Inequality (1998).

  105. Johnston and Percy-Smith (2003), 329.

  106. See B. Fine, Social Capital versus Social Theory (2001), chapter 7, and Michael W. Foley and Bob Edwards, “Is it time to disinvest in social capital?,” Journal of Public Policy 19/2: 963–971.

  107. J. Goldthorpe, “Globalization and Social Classes,” (2002). He argues that the divergent ideas of what exclusion is from leads to widely different estimates of the size of the excluded population.

  108. J. Goldthorpe, “Globalization and Social Classes,” (2002), 21.

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The authors are grateful to the Theory and Society reviewers for their very helpful comments on this article.

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  1. School of Sociology, Social Policy and Social Work, Queen’s University, Belfast, BT7 1NN, Northern Ireland

    Mary Daly

  2. Department of Sociology, Brown University, Box 1916 Maxcy Hall, Providence, RI, 02912, USA

    Hilary Silver

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Daly, M., Silver, H. Social exclusion and social capital: A comparison and critique. Theor Soc 37, 537–566 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11186-008-9062-4

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