| The challenge of designing public policy in today's complex society calls for an alternative to traditional methods of governance. Most recently, the rise of network governance models that foster a civic infrastructure allowing participation from the all sectors to shape public policy is evident. One of the most prevalent appearances of network governance is the provision of social services and other public goods through nonprofit-government partnerships.; This thesis evaluates the collaboration between the AmeriCorps National Civilian Community Corps (NCCC) and the nonprofit communities in which they work. A primary goal of this collaboration is to "strengthen the ties that bind us together", resulting in a proposed increased amount of bridging social capital. This leads to the question, "Can the government foster social capital development, and further, should it, and if so, how can it?"; Most research on social capital takes a micro-level approach, focusing on individual behaviors (such as voting behavior). This thesis applies Social Network Analysis (SNA) for taking a community level assessment of social capital. In this view, social networks are a proxy for social capital. Social networks are sets of individuals or groups who are connected to one another through meaningful social relationships. Network theories applied to this thesis indicate that networks rich in both weak ties, bridges, and structural holes contain higher levels of social capital.; Four communities that partnered with the AmeriCorps NCCC were evaluated by measuring changes to the social network structure of the communities in terms of weak ties, bridges, and structural holes. The findings suggest that the intervention of the AmeriCorps NCCC can be effective at fostering the development of weak ties, bridges, and structural holes in communities that have high levels of trust, information flow, and highly active network connections. The value of the resulting bridging social capital is discussed and the importance of this type of social capital is emphasized. The role of trust to weak ties is explored and research hypotheses for examining this phenomenon are suggested. Finally, it is suggested that open networks better foster bridging social capital, particularly in network governance models. |
