On Social Poverty: Human Development and the Distribution of Social Capital

Among social scientists, development theorists, and policy makers there is today an emergent consensus about the multidimensional and contextual character of poverty. Working within the framework of such a consensus in this article, I attempt to identify the social dimension of human poverty. Most generally, I try to sketch an account of social poverty as a shared normative (or soft) constraint on human action and interaction. The argument is developed as follows. I begin by summarizing and then using social capital theory to characterize my account of social poverty more fully. Here I distinguish between what I call horizontal social capital (networks of social trust and connections that are accessible and appropriable within a specific socioeconomic or cultural stratum) and vertical social capital (networks of social trust and connections that are accessible and appropriable between and among various socioeconomic and cultural strata). I argue that social poverty is an absence or scarcity of vertical social capital. From there I go on to analyze some of the mechanisms and asymmetrical effects of social poverty in specific empirical contexts. In closing I reflect briefly on how the problem of social poverty has been addressed in the US context. I suggest that reducing social poverty requires both a bottom-up approach towards the creation of vertical social capital and a top-down approach aimed at the diversification of existing stores of horizontal social capital.