Concepts of
Human and Social Capital:
impact for schools
07/16/09

What are governments, societies,
individuals striving for? What
are their objectives?
personal
human progress happiness
social inclusion
social cohesion
economic
social welfare growth
life satisfaction
quality of life
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Human and economic well-being
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Human and economic well-being
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Human and economic well-being
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‘Capital’
‘human capital revolution’: from land,
physical capital, etc. to human capital
education = investing in human capital
return; rates of return
from narrow economical notion of
human capital to broader notion of
human and social capital
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Human and social capital
07/16/09

Human and social capital
Human Capital Social Capital
resides in individuals resides in social
• knowledge relations and networks
• skills • networking
• attributes • shared norms, values
developed in formal and understandings
and informal learning built by investments in
facilitating creation of families, communities,
personal, social and … to nations
economic well-being variety of benefits
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Human capital: key elements
1. Communication 1. Inter-personal skills
literacy teamwork
2nd language comp leardership
2. Numeracy 2. Other skills and
3. Intra-personal skills attributes
motivation facility in using ICT
learning-to-learn tacit knowledge
capacity to make problem-solving
ethical judgements etc.
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Human capital: measurement
educational attainment
years of schooling
credentials, degrees
actual skills and competences
from self-assessment
to realistic measurements
to comparative international assessment
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Human capital: e.g. literacy
Sweden 6 19 39 36
Netherlands 10 26 44 20
Flanders 15 24 43 17
Germany 9 33 40 19
Canada 18 25 32 25
Australia 17 28 38 17
Switzerland 18 29 37 16
United States 24 26 31 19
United Kingdom 23 27 31 19
New Zealand 21 29 32 18
Ireland 25 32 32 12
Poland 45 31 18 6
level 1 level 2 level 3 level 4/5
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Social capital: key elements
involvement in community and
organizational life
public engagement (incl. voting)
community and volunteering
informal sociability
inter-personal trust
bonding – bridging – linking
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Social capital: measurement
still in its infancy
use of proxy measures (club meeting, …)
or inverse measures (crime, family
breakdown, …)
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Social capital: e.g. trust
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Educational impact
human capital < learning investments in
various settings
social and cultural contexts are important
learning arrangements affect social and
cultural distribution of human capital
inequality of educational opportunities go
hand in hand with economic inequality and
overall human capital standards
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Educational impact
human capital has a strong impact on
well-being of individuals and societies
employment and earnings, economic growth
health and social welfare
lowering crime
civic participation
subjective well-being
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Educational impact
social capital is built in variety of
institutions, but also learning environments
has a big impact on health, social
integration, happiness, child welfare
but also has economic benefits
human and social capital mutually
reinforcing
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