Social Capital in Organizations: An Exchange Theory Approach

As recently as one generation ago, the term organization was synonymous with stasis, reliability, hierarchy and disciplined productivity. The new guiding principles of management practise, meanwhile, are dynamism, flexibility, teams and emancipated interactivity. The new key term “network” has summed up these contemporary organizational trends. This study suggests the interpretation of networks as social capital of individuals and organizations. This understanding requires a theoretical and methodological refocusing on the actions of the organization’s members. The present study places a variant of action theory – socioeconomic exchange theory – centre stage, fuses this theory with the toolkit of social network analysis and puts the resulting synthesis to the test by examining cooperation among equal members of an organization.