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Making Democracy Work in the Heart of Emilia: An Empirical Investigation of Social Capital

Carelli, Daniel LU (2016) STVK02 20152
Department of Political Science
Abstract
The purpose of this thesis is to take the temperature of social capital in four cities
– Bologna, Modena, Reggio nell’Emilia, and Parma – in the historical region
Emilia in Italy. Social capital, which has been described as ‘the key to making
democracy work’ is conceptualized and decomposed into two key variables: trust
and participation. Furthermore, the study consists of new empirical statistical data
compiled by myself. With this theoretical framework, context, and empirical
material I pose the question: what is each city’s level of social capital and what
variations can be exposed? The results, which are limited to the questions in the
survey, indicate that the cities have a relatively low score of social capital,
especially... (More)
The purpose of this thesis is to take the temperature of social capital in four cities
– Bologna, Modena, Reggio nell’Emilia, and Parma – in the historical region
Emilia in Italy. Social capital, which has been described as ‘the key to making
democracy work’ is conceptualized and decomposed into two key variables: trust
and participation. Furthermore, the study consists of new empirical statistical data
compiled by myself. With this theoretical framework, context, and empirical
material I pose the question: what is each city’s level of social capital and what
variations can be exposed? The results, which are limited to the questions in the
survey, indicate that the cities have a relatively low score of social capital,
especially in the dimension that highlights trust. The results also expose a pattern
where Bologna and Parma are performing relatively better than Reggio and
Modena, in almost all variables measured. Citizens from all cities tend to
participate in public affairs through channels, such as the media, Internet and
demonstrations, instead of through political parties, and they all indicate a
moderately low confidence in political institutions. In its concluding chapter, this
thesis moreover gives three suggestions for further studies: (1) to further examine
the methodological complexity and how to enable more precise studies of social
capital; (2) to continue the study of urban social capital but in a wider comparative
context with rural social capital, and; (3) to further examine the socio-spatiality of
social capital, to simply study the creation and appearance of social capital in
place and space. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
Carelli, Daniel LU
supervisor
organization
course
STVK02 20152
year
type
M2 - Bachelor Degree
subject
keywords
social capital, civic trust, civic participation, survey, Italy, Emilia
language
English
id
8513681
date added to LUP
2016-02-02 13:57:36
date last changed
2016-02-02 13:57:36
@misc{8513681,
  abstract     = {{The purpose of this thesis is to take the temperature of social capital in four cities
– Bologna, Modena, Reggio nell’Emilia, and Parma – in the historical region
Emilia in Italy. Social capital, which has been described as ‘the key to making
democracy work’ is conceptualized and decomposed into two key variables: trust
and participation. Furthermore, the study consists of new empirical statistical data
compiled by myself. With this theoretical framework, context, and empirical
material I pose the question: what is each city’s level of social capital and what
variations can be exposed? The results, which are limited to the questions in the
survey, indicate that the cities have a relatively low score of social capital,
especially in the dimension that highlights trust. The results also expose a pattern
where Bologna and Parma are performing relatively better than Reggio and
Modena, in almost all variables measured. Citizens from all cities tend to
participate in public affairs through channels, such as the media, Internet and
demonstrations, instead of through political parties, and they all indicate a
moderately low confidence in political institutions. In its concluding chapter, this
thesis moreover gives three suggestions for further studies: (1) to further examine
the methodological complexity and how to enable more precise studies of social
capital; (2) to continue the study of urban social capital but in a wider comparative
context with rural social capital, and; (3) to further examine the socio-spatiality of
social capital, to simply study the creation and appearance of social capital in
place and space.}},
  author       = {{Carelli, Daniel}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  note         = {{Student Paper}},
  title        = {{Making Democracy Work in the Heart of Emilia: An Empirical Investigation of Social Capital}},
  year         = {{2016}},
}