Social Capital-Social Costs Umapathi Attikuppam1, Dr. Venkatramana Chintala2 1Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, City University, Mogadishu, Somalia 2Assistant Professor (C), Department of Politics and International Studies, Pondicherry University, Puducherry, India Online published on 28 July, 2016. Abstract Social capital is one of the critically discussed topics in social sciences in the last couple of decades. The acceleration in the volume of articles or books on the concept of social capital in recent years point to the fact that many social scientists are relating it to their particular fields, and are reorienting their approach by converging their respective areas with social capital. Social capital is considered as a factor that could help both individuals and society at large. Robert Putnam's analysis in his book, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of the American Community, points to the theory that promoting social capital helps in bridging the communities, and subsequently helps the communities in creating inclusive and participatory culture that could help them achieve their socio-economic and political needs. The concept of social capital has been embraced by its believers in the hope that its promotion could be a way to solve some of the socio-economic and political problems that the society is facing. But the concept of social capital is not free from pitfalls. In fact, the concept itself seems to be constructed in a way to give legitimate advantage to those who are in affluent positions in the society. While most of the research so far concentrated on the benefits that it brings to the individuals or groups, this paper is an attempt to look at how some ones social capital acts as a hindrance to others fair opportunities, and it tries to look at how social capital is used as a stealth weapon by few individuals or sections when it comes to gaining access to socio-economic and political opportunities that otherwise may not be possible without it. Top Keywords Civic Culture, Individual Social Capital, Merit, Sectional Capital, Social Capital, Social Cost. Top |