Working paper
Does Ethnic Diversity Affect Social Capital in the Russian Context?
The article examines differences between two Russian regions – Moscow and Bashkortostan – through the following socio-psychological indicators: perceived social capital, trust, civil identity, life satisfaction, and economic attitudes.
The book includes proceedings of the conference “Business. Society. Human” (October 30–31, 2013, Moscow) organized by National Research University Higher School of Economics. The purpose of the conference: interdisciplinary analysis of actual problems of studying business in the social sciences: the relationship between business and society; social capital and trust; business and corporate culture; individual, group and organization in business; problems and prospects of business education and business consulting, etc. The book present the results of researches of trust and social capital carried out in various countries in Europe, Asia and in Russia. Authors are well-known sociologists, psychologists and economists. The results of these researches were presented at the conference. The papers are published as they were submitted by the author.
The purpose of this paper is to analyze the relationship between social capital and subjective ranking of household economic well-being in transition countries. The current study tests whether the performance of formal institutions moderates this link. The analyses are based on the data from the second wave of the Life in Transition Survey. The measures “generosity of welfare policy (social safety nets)” and “ability of formal institutions to control inflation” were provided by the Bertelsmann Transformation Index Project. The study uses four measures of social capital: trust in family, trust in friends and acquaintances, trust in most people, the number of support sources. To test the hypotheses, the study employs mixed-effects regression models. The study indicates a significant positive effect of social capital on subjective household well-being. Formal institutions do not have a significant effect on subjective ranking of household well-being. The evidence on institutions as moderators rejects the substitution effect between formal institutions and social capital. Higher generosity of welfare policy institutions and higher ability of formal institutions to control inflation strengthen the positive effect of particular trust (trust in family and trust in friends and acquaintances) on subjective ranking on the ladder of social standing (subjective ranking of household well-being), which is in line with the “crowding in” theory. The paper adds on the limited research on transition countries. The paper contributes to the discussion on “crowding in” and “crowding out” effects of formal institutions on social capital.
The article discusses personality networking behavior as a mechanism of building the social capital in a social network. The concepts of social and functional roles, social exchange theory, social network analysis (network role discovery) and the phenomenon of social capital are included to explore the problem. Theoretical and empirical studies are brought together to explain the connections between an individual and his or her network position in a social structure, as well as his or her networking behavior. We assume that personal networking strategy relies on values and is actualized in a certain way of social behavior, thus helping to exert the individual’s influence on his or her social capital buil. This construct allows as to understand personality as both pursuing some personal goals and working on social capital formation of social network.
The aim of this article is to consider the consolidation of social capital in two Russian state organizations under the context of different generational cohorts, namely, Baby Boomers, Generation X and Y, and the features of their organizational behavior. Consolidation of social capital is based on the integrated semantic area that could include the estimation of organizational culture, employees’ commitment to company goals and values as well as strong organizational identification. Extensively, consolidation of social capital is determined by organizational, generational and subcultural peculiarities of staff. Altogether, 250 employees participated in this study and filled in three questionnaires to estimate organizational culture, commitment and four dimensions of identification. The data collected in two sample groups (90 and 160 people) in St. Petersburg and Petrozavodsk respectively demonstrated the significant differences among generational cohorts both in the organization and between them. The most hardships in the consolidation of social capital undergo generation X whose formative years had been within Perestroika span and strong social changes in Russia. All that is reflected at their level of organizational identification and contradictions while perceiving current and preferred organizational cultures.
Modern practice of management of human resources is based, along with other concepts, on the Talent management concept. There are pro-active employees among a talent employees, whose competences allow to consider them as perspective candidates for replacement of managerial positions. In order that development of pro-active employees and planning of their career was adequate to both their competences, and requirements of the organization, the system of additional roles for such employees is offered. Step-by-step development of these roles allows not only estimating the potential of the pro-active employee, but also practically to prepare it for administrative activity in modern conditions.
The book’s stated objective is to uncover context, “how social capital interacts with social institutions.” It is part of a new wave of research on social capital that, dissatisfied with both macro analyses limited to societal patterns and micro analyses limited to actors’ conditions, seeks to understand the operation of networks at the meso-level: how institutions and organizations structure the transfer of resources across networks. It purports to make both theoretical and methodological contributions, the first by developing the concept of “institutional logics,” the latter by “casting diverse contextual settings as ‘generators’ of social relations”, and studying these contexts from multiple methodological perspectives. (from a review by M. Small)