Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t8hqh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T09:30:30.007Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Re-examining a modern classic: does Putnam's Making Democracy Work suffer from spuriousness?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 January 2016

Joan Barceló
Joan Barceló*
Affiliation:
Department of Political and Social Sciences, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain and The Wilf Department of Politics, New York University, New York, USA
*
∗Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

What makes democratic institutions work efficiently? Robert Putnam argued in Making Democracy Work that a mixture of political participation and immersion in associative and social networks in the community, conceptualised as ‘civic community’ or ‘social capital’, is the explanation. Ever since its publication, many questions have arisen about the validity of Putnam's theory. Among the most relevant concerns stands the influence of the Italian Communist Party on Putnam's empirical tests. This paper aims to fill the gap left in the literature by testing Putnam's hypothesis against the political party in the regional government and the PCI's electoral support. Supporting Putnam, this paper finds that variations in the quality of democratic governments in Italy's regions are a function of civic community even after adjusting for the presence of the Italian Communist Party.

Keywords

democracysocial capitalcivic communityPutnamItalian Communist Party
Type
Articles
Information
Modern Italy , Volume 19 , Issue 4 , November 2014 , pp. 457 - 471
Copyright
Copyright © Association for the study of Modern Italy 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Almond, Gabriel A. and Verba, Sidney. 1963. The Civic Culture: Political Attitudes and Democracy in Five Nations. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boix, Carles, and Posner, Daniel N.. 1996. Making Social Capital Work: A Review of Robert Putnam's Making Democracy Work, Civic Traditions in Modern Italy. Cambridge, MA: Center for International Affairs, Harvard University.Google Scholar
Boix, Carles, and Posner, Daniel N.. 2000. “Capital Social y Democracia.” Revista Española de Ciencia Politica 1 (2): 159–185.Google Scholar
Cohn, Samuel K. 1994. “La storia secondo Robert Putnam.” Polis 8 (2): 315–324.Google Scholar
Foley, Michael W., and Edwards, Bob. 1996. “The Paradox of Civil Society.” Journal of Democracy 1 (3): 38–52.Google Scholar
Golafshani, Nahid. 2003. “Understanding Reliability and Validity in Qualitative Research.” The Qualitative Report 8 (4): 597–607.Google Scholar
Goldberg, Ellis. 1996. “Thinking about How Democracy Works.” Politics & Society 24 (1): 7–18.Google Scholar
Gramsci, Antonio. 2001. “Further Selections from the Prison Notebooks of Antonio Gramsci.” ElecBook.Google Scholar
Granato, Jim, Inglehart, Ronald, and Leblang, David. 1996. “Cultural Values, Stable Democracy, and Economic Development: A Reply.” American Journal of Political Science 40 (3): 680–696.Google Scholar
Grootaert, Christiaan. 1998. “Social Capital: The Missing Link?” Social Capital Initiative Working Paper 3.Google Scholar
Huck, Schuyler W. 2012. Reading Statistics and Research. Boston: Pearson.Google Scholar
Jackman, Robert W., and Miller, Ross A.. 1996. “A Renaissance of Political Culture?” American Journal of Political Science 40 (3): 632–659.Google Scholar
Karimi, Sirvan. 2011. “Contradictions of Capitalism and Their Ideological Counterparts: The Neo-Liberal Project and the Concept of “Social Capital”.” International Journal of Criminology and Sociological Theory 4 (2): 718–732.Google Scholar
Kohn, Margaret. 1999. “Civic Republicanism versus Social Struggle: A Gramscian Approach to Associationalism in Italy.” Political Power and Social Theory 13: 201–238.Google Scholar
Kutner, Michael H., Nachtsheim, Chris, and Neter, John. 2008. Applied Linear Regression Models. Boston: McGraw-Hill.Google Scholar
Laitin, David D. 1995. “The Civic Culture at 30.” American Political Science Review 89 (1): 168–173.Google Scholar
Levi, Margaret. 1996. “Social and Unsocial Capital: A Review Essay of Robert Putnam's Making Democracy Work.” Politics & Society 24 (1): 45–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewis-Beck, Michael S., Bryman, Alan, and Liao, Tim Futing. 2004. The Sage Encyclopedia of Social Science Research Methods. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.Google Scholar
Norris, Pippa. 1999. Critical Citizens: Global Support for Democratic Government. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Norris, Pippa. 2011. Democratic Deficit: Critical Citizens Revisited. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Paldam, Martin. 2002. “Social Capital: One or Many? Definition and Measurement.” Journal of Economic Surveys 14 (5): 629–653.Google Scholar
Putnam, Robert D., Leonardi, Robert, Nanetti, Raffaella Y., and Pavoncello, Franco. 1983. “Explaining Institutional Success: The Case of Italian Regional Government.” The American Political Science Review 11 (1): 55–74.Google Scholar
Putnam, Robert D., with Leonardi, Robert, and Nanetti, Raffaella. 1993. Making Democracy Work: Civic Traditions in Modern Italy. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Putzel, James. 1997. “Policy Arena: Accounting for the “Dark Side” of Social Capital: Reading Robert Putnam on Democracy.” Journal of International Development 9 (7): 939–949.3.0.CO;2-4>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ríos Cázares, Alejandra, and Figueroa, Julio Ríos. 1999. “Capital social y democracia: una revisión crítica de Putnam.” Política y Gobierno 4 (2): 513–528.Google Scholar
Rothstein, Bo. 2001. “Social Capital in the Social Democratic Welfare State.” Politics & Society 29 (2): 207–241.Google Scholar
Sabetti, Filippo. 1996. “Path Dependency and Civic Culture: Some Lessons from Italy about Interpreting Social Experiments.” Politics & Society 24 (1): 19–44.Google Scholar
Solt, Frederick. 2004. “Civics or Structure? Revisiting the Origins of Democratic Quality in the Italian Regions.” British Journal of Political Science 34 (1): 123–135.Google Scholar
Swank, Duane. 1996. “Culture, Institutions, and Economic Growth: Theory, Recent Evidence, and the Role of Communitarian Polities.” American Journal of Political Science 40 (3): 660–679.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tarrow, Sidney. 1996. “Making Social Science Work across Space and Time: A Critical Reflection on Robert Putnam's Making Democracy Work.” American Political Science Review 90 (2): 389–397.Google Scholar
Torcal, Mariano. 2006. Political Disaffection in Contemporary Democracies: Social Capital, Institutions and Politics. Vol. 13. Abingdon: Routledge.Google Scholar
Webber, Jeffrey R. 2003. “Political Power and Social Theory.” Review of Radical Political Economics 35 (3): 366–369.Google Scholar