This paper carries out an empirical assessment of the causal nexus connecting social capital’s diverse aspects to the “quality” of economic development in Italy. The analysis accounts for three main social capital dimensions (i.e. bonding, bridging and linking social capital) and measures...

This paper carries out an empirical assessment of the causal nexus connecting social capital’s diverse aspects to the “quality” of economic development in Italy. The analysis accounts for three main social capital dimensions (i.e. bonding, bridging and linking social capital) and measures...

There is a surprising gap in the economic literature on social capital. First, we lack studies addressing the effects of social capital on those facets of development that can contribute in making growth more sustainable in the long run, like, for example, human development and social cohesion....

There is wide consensus that entrepreneurial talent is the ability to discover and exploit market opportunities by taking the relevant risky decisions. Discovery and exploitation are separate but interlinked features of entrepreneurship requiring, in different proportions, the exploitation of...

The main question of this paper is: what type of social capital is able to mitigate labour precariousness and to foster human development? This issue has been addressed through a review of the literature and an empirical investigation on the Italian regions. The analysis shows that only bonding...

This paper addresses two hot topics of the contemporary debate, social capital and economic growth. Our theoretical analysis sheds light on decisive but so far neglected issues: how does social capital accumulate over time? Which is the relationship between social capital, technical progress and...

We develop a dynamic model to analyze the sources and the evolution of social participation and social capital in a growing economy characterized by exogenous technical progress. Starting from the assumption that the well-being of agents basically depends on material and relational goods, we...

This paper uses a dataset built by the author on the basis of raw data taken from different national surveys to carry out an investigation into the socio-economic determinants of couples’ childbearing decisions in Italy. Since having children is in most cases a “couple matter”, the...

Nell’ultimo Rapporto sullo Sviluppo Umano delle Nazioni Unite, si afferma che gli Obiettivi di Sviluppo del Millennio potranno essere raggiunti solo se acquisteranno significato per i miliardi di individui per i quali sono stati concepiti. La gestione diretta degli aiuti internazionali da...

Attraverso una rassegna critica della letteratura, questo paper vuole fornire una prima introduzione al concetto di capitale sociale e dare conto del dibattito in corso su questo tema da più di un decennio. Gli studi presi in considerazione sono ripartiti in base al particolare aspetto della...