Internet Capital
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Russell Hardin
Abstract
The Internet is a huge form of social capital that is not reducible in its characteristics to other forms of social capital, such as ordinary networks of people who more or less know each other. It enables us to do many things with radically greater efficiency than we could without it. It can do some things better but other things much less well than traditional devices can. At both extremes, the differences are so great as to be not merely quantitative but also qualitative. The things it can do better include things that can readily be checked and verified. The things that it often cannot do include securing commitments for action. A brief history of the forms of social cooperation suggests that relationships on the Internet are typically too thin to back trust and cooperation among those who do not have fairly rich relations hips off-line.
© 2004 by Lucius & Lucius, Stuttgart
Articles in the same Issue
- Community and Human Social Nature Contemporary Society
- Three Aspects of Interpersonal Trust
- The Social Psychology of Trust with Applications in the Internet
- Cooperation and Community an the Internet: Past Issues and Present Perspectives for Theoretical-Empirical Internet Research
- Developing Trust on the Internet
- Trust, Reliance and the Internet
- Internet Capital
- Esteem, ldentifiability and the Internet
- Reputation and Internet Auctions: eBay and Beyond
- Trust among Internet Traders
- The Evolution of Trust(worthiness) in the Net
- The Emergence of Trust Networks under Uncertainty – Implications for Internet Interactions
- Local Virtuality in a High-Tech Networked Organization
- How May Virtual Communication Shape Cooperation in a Work Team?
- Trust and Community in Open Source Software Production
- Crime, Law and the Internet
Articles in the same Issue
- Community and Human Social Nature Contemporary Society
- Three Aspects of Interpersonal Trust
- The Social Psychology of Trust with Applications in the Internet
- Cooperation and Community an the Internet: Past Issues and Present Perspectives for Theoretical-Empirical Internet Research
- Developing Trust on the Internet
- Trust, Reliance and the Internet
- Internet Capital
- Esteem, ldentifiability and the Internet
- Reputation and Internet Auctions: eBay and Beyond
- Trust among Internet Traders
- The Evolution of Trust(worthiness) in the Net
- The Emergence of Trust Networks under Uncertainty – Implications for Internet Interactions
- Local Virtuality in a High-Tech Networked Organization
- How May Virtual Communication Shape Cooperation in a Work Team?
- Trust and Community in Open Source Software Production
- Crime, Law and the Internet
