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WEBINAR: Toward a Unified Conceptualization of Social Capital

Free Public Webinar on Zoom and YouTube
Tuesday, November 11, 2025 @ 4:00 pm – 5:30 pm EDT

Invited Speaker

Professor jimi adams

Sociology
McCausland College of Arts and Sciences
University of South Carolina

Social capital is among the most broadly used concepts in social science. Despite its shared understanding as beneficial resources available from the connections between people, authors vary widely in their conceptualizations of social capital. To extract clarity from these disparate perspectives, we offer a systematic framework for conceptualizing social capital, which identifies three primary theoretical dimensions of scholars’ conceptualizations of social capital: (a) where beneficial resources reside, ranging from within individuals to the relationships between individuals; (b) beneficial network structure, differentiating closure from brokerage arrangements; and (c) the level to which rewards accrue, distinguishing individual from collective benefits. We illustrate how combining these dimensions produces a unifying perspective that fosters reintegrating social capital’s disconnected conceptualizations. Finally, we draw on this framework to both reconcile seeming contradictions and gaps in social capital scholarship, and provide a principled means for prioritizing questions for future developments of social capital.

About the presenter:

jimi adams studies how networks constrain or promote the diffusion of information and/or diseases through populations. Much of this work has focused on HIV/AIDS and Covid-19 among populations in the US and Sub-Saharan Africa. Recently, his work has focused more on the integrative patterns and processes in problem-focused areas of science that draw from many academic disciplines (e.g., HIV/AIDS, demography, the environment).

Register for this webinar

About Our Webinar Series

This event is part of our regular webinar sessions for social capital researchers including PhD/master students. These sessions include invited presentations from prominent scholars as well as presentations by PhD students and experts in professional practice.

For social capital researchers, these sessions are an opportunity to hear about the latest social capital research and insights from scholars working on the concept. They can be a great way to connect with people, to get advice, discuss ideas or issues, get suggestions for literature to read, or you can just listen.

Are you researching social capital and want to present your research? Click here for more information and to submit a proposal.

Generally, presentations can be 20 to 30 mins. The content of your presentation will depend on your research stage.

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