聚合还是桥接:社会资本整合问题的研究图景与展望

Bonding or Bridging:Taking Stock of Research on Social Capital Integration and Looking Forward

过去二十年间组织与管理领域关于社会资本的研究中,学者们围绕聚合和桥接两种形式社会资本的概念、功能及作用机制进行了丰富的讨论。在此基础上,二者之间的矛盾及互补关系逐渐被揭示,不少学者强调二者整合的重要性。随之而来的关键问题是二者应当如何整合。围绕这个理论议题,在梳理现有文献并阐述其理论缘由的基础上,本文依据社会资本的形式(聚合—桥接)及生成机制和作用层次(关系—结构)两个维度提出了一个综合分析框架。基于此框架,一方面我们描摹出现有研究的类别图谱;另一方面,我们进一步总结了现有研究体现出的两种形式社会资本的不同整合方式。在阐述与讨论现有整合方式之后,我们结合其他理论视角,对当前社会资本整合的研究路径和思路进行了多层次拓展,并讨论了可能的未来研究方向和议题。本文展示了对社会资本整合问题研究的整体理解和系统认识,同时也为领域发展和后续研究思路提供了跨层次和多视角的参考。

Over the decades of research on social capital in the field of management,scholars have distinguished between bonding and bridging forms of social capital,and elaborated on their definitions,functions,and operating mechanisms.Bonding capital refers to the form of social capital generated through strong ties or closed network structure,while the formation of bridging capital is based on bridging ties or structural holes.Research has extensively explored the advantages and disadvantages of these two forms of social capital for individuals,teams,and organizations.Along this line of inquiry,the paradoxical tension between these two forms of social capital as well as their complementarity have been gradually revealed,and the importance of integrating them has been increasingly emphasized.The question then is:How can individual or collective actors integrate these two forms of social capital?Centering on this puzzle,we systematically review the literature and propose a framework to classify prior research along two dimensions—the form of social capital(bonding versus bridging)and the level of network mechanisms(relational versus structural).On the one hand,we position current research into different categories(i.e.,bonding-relational,bridging-relational,bonding-structural,and bridg-ing-structural) in order to evaluate their accumulative knowledge, and also elaborate on the connections among these categories to map the whole field;on the other hand, we summarize and discern among different approaches to integrating the two forms of social capital, primarily including relational-level integration, structural-level integration, and the combination of relational- and structur-allevel integration. Drawing on insights from other theoretical perspectives, such as human capital, network pluralism, and insti-tutional embeddedness, we further discuss the deficiencies of research in this field and then propose several possible directions for future research. Specifically, future research on social capital integration could benefit from more attention to the constituent factors of social networks and the organizational and institutional contexts in which actors are embedded. We further discuss the following five possible future research directions. First, at the level of networking actors, we propose that scholars should pay more attention to networking actors’ human capital and the interactions between actors’ human capital and social capital. Second, at the level of social relationships, tie multiplexity and relational pluralism merit more attention. Third, at the level of organizational context, as social relationships among individuals or teams are embedded in organizations, how organizational factors, such as formal structure and organizational design may affect the integration of two forms of social capital is another promising direction. Forth, at the level of institutional context, future research can delve into the influence of institutional embeddedness of social networks on the integration of social capital since all social ties are deeply embedded in their concrete cultural and institutional environment. Finally, consider-ing that social capital are not static and social networks are in constant change and evolution, scholars could explore how to integrate bonding and bridging capital in a more dynamic view and examine the complex impact of network evolution on social capital inte-gration. To sum up, this study emphasizes the theoretical and practical value of integrating both bonding and bridging social capital, and it contributes to the literature mainly in two ways. First, we are among the first to offer a systematic review and analysis of the re-search on integrating different forms of social capital, which helps us achieve a holistic understanding of the origin and development of this topic. Second, by integrating social capital theory with other theorical perspectives, as well as incorporating insights from recent development in network research, we offer suggestions to extend and deepen the inquiry of social capital integration in future research.