Identifying, assessing, protecting, developing and creating Social Capital

Do social goods increase under Corona? As a result of the World Social Capital Monitor 2020, an increase of social goods could be considered in 26 mostly emerging (we stopped to call them developing) countries. While the survey took place from May to September 2020, we are now able to compare the level of eight social goods between 2019 and 2020.
The first question was „Please characterize the Social Climate of your place“ on a ladder between 10 (excellent) and 1 (poor). As you can see from the chart, we considered a significant increase in ten countries. Any increase between 0 and 0.5 is within the random range of deviation and will therefore not be featured as a change.

Another surprise is the low average deviation for these estimates of the social climate: 1.7 in Congo, 1.5 in Croatia, 1.4 in Austria. The deviation for the questions on austerity measures and taxes, in general,  is much higher, mostly more than two points. So why do people agree on their local social climate in such different environments as the Republic of Congo and Austria?

This is the question of the research on social capital, that Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz once called ‚a tacit knowledge‘.

Our survey happens on the surface of this tacit knowledge. Communities and groups build their social climate and share their social goods without planning it. Recently Rudger Bregmann reclaimed the existence of an altruistic Humankind that explains many collective actions. According to Bregmann, helpfulness is as contagious as a virus.

To seeing Kosovo at the top of any chart is exceptional. But helpfulness increased in Kosovo by 1.4 points from 2019 to 2020.

As well Albania, Serbia, and Bosnia noted an increase in helpfulness. The Corona crisis seems to evoke and to accelerate shared social goods and virtues. For decades young people are leaving the Western Balkans. The European Union welcomes their cheap labour. To building up sustainable communities in the Western Balkans requires all social goods in one: interpersonal trust, willingness to co-finance public goods, willingness to invest in local small enterprises and cooperatives, helpfulness, friendliness and hospitality,

The Western Balkans division of the European Union rejected to consider our 2019 report on the six Western Balkan countries.

Now the World Social Capital Monitor 2020 with the great news on increasing social goods is published within the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals Partnerships.

You can download the 49 printer-friendly pages as a PDF here.