Prologue to the Measurement of Social Capital

Social capital has become quite a popular concept in the sociological and economic literature, and even in the general press. Scientific investigations using this concept have measured it, however, usually in rather ad hoc fashions. In this paper I discuss possible approaches that could be followed to measure the social capital of individuals. What kind of questions should be posed to the individual, and how should these questions be aggregated to a measure of his or her social capital? The discussion in this paper is of a conceptual nature and does not go up to the concrete questions to be asked.