Description
Book SynopsisExamines the complex relationships between social capital, markets and democracy. This title argues that participation in markets positively enriches and enhances the stock of social capital, while, conversely, democratic politics may undermine it by facilitating divisive rent-seeking by special interest groups.
Table of ContentsIntroduction; Defining social capital; Social capital, social democracy and the critique of liberal markets; Classical liberalism, markets and the spontaneous generation of bridging social capital; Markets and the mix between bonding and bridging social capital; Social capital, social democracy and the case for the enabling state; Social capital and democracy; Social capital and the provision of collective goods; Social capital and policy success; Strategies for building social capital; Social capital and the enabling state: an Austrian perspective; Markets and the Austrian critique of democratic planning; Social capital and the enabling state: an Austrian critique of 'cultural planning'; Social capital and the enabling state: a public choice perspective; Public choice theory and the limits of participatory democracy; Social capital and the enabling state: public choice and the corruption of civil society; Conclusions.
