Social capital - our most valuable resource

Social capital is, unquestionably, of more value to Australia and those who live here than any other resource.

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse -
they have now been joined by a fifth.

The goodwill we demonstrate toward others, regardless of who they might be, will benefit people of this island nation, and by implication Shepparton, more than anything we might care to point to.

Social capital, being such an intangible part of society and a concept that escapes traditional forms of measurement, is considered by pragmatists to be simply pointless philosophical meanderings.

However, should the life of an individual, a community or even a whole nation be facing tremulous times, then people instinctively turn to the well of social capital to sate their thirst; or need, for the warmth, support, encouragement that only another can give.

Although a nebulous and so ill-defined thing, social capital has meanings as numerous as those who have attempted to define it.

One definition of social capital declares it is about the value of social networks that bond similar people and build bridges between diverse people, with norms of mutuality.

Social capital is also about sharing information, having trust in others and living a life of reciprocity, which in colloquial terms means you return a favour, and often the help given is often simply humane or philanthropic and so not ignited by any previous actions that warrant re-payment.

The Goulburn Valley was once as xenophobic as most places in the world, but that intolerance was first softened when Chinese people arrived in the area about the time of Victoria’s 19^th century gold rush, followed by an surge in the arrival of southern Europeans after the Second World War and continues with the flood of settlers from Middle Eastern countries and many from parts of Africa.

The arrival of new people enriches a community’s social capital and the diversity of Greater Shepparton is such that it is becoming one of Australia’s richest resources.

Social capital’s arrival in the Goulburn Valley, and Shepparton and Mooroopna in particular, has been partly organic, becoming a growth that is orchestrated by a few, but in general is a response by new arrivals to the tolerance, generosity and support given by those already living here – that is social capital at work.

The strength and social validity of the community has become known and so, simply, more people want to live here.

We have generous dollop of social capital, but not for a second should we assume plain sailing for loitering on the horizon are the “Five” Horsemen of the Apocalypse – energy scarcity, burgeoning populations, human-induced climate difficulties, the militarization and fracturing of the world’s economy, and a strange and inexplicable reluctance of most to consider their behaviour.

Social capital is the only thing that will help us confront, and move those horsemen on.

Progress invariably linked to the economy

Progress, a recent meeting in Melbourne seemed to agree, was invariably linked to our economy.

A $14 trillion debt threatens to
 unravel the U.S. economy.

Nothing, not even an idea, could be advanced, it was noddingly agreed, until it could be demonstrated that what was proposed would financially enrich the community, or particularly, some individuals.

Money followed barter and is one of civilization’s earliest inventions and its implications have troubled us ever since as his or her success has long been measured by the financial capital they controlled or could influence.

However, while there is no denying the power of such capital, it is always social capital that is overlooked and rarely valued.

With the world locked onto a trajectory that will see us progress into damnably difficult times in which financial capital will be of little value and social capital will have values never seen before, certainly in modern times, or understood.

In times past, and in some countries, your affluence was measured by the size of your woodpile, but as we venture into circumstances unknown, affluence will be more about your social network than the size of your woodpile, although that would undoubtedly be helpful.

The adage suggesting it is who you know rather than what you know is what matters will become increasingly important, but for reasons different to those that have added meat to the adage.

Finding and securing affluence in society as we know and understand it was linked, sometimes to knowledge in a chosen field, but frequently from links within the same social stratum – nepotism was at play.

Rather than preferential treatment for a few, the community of tomorrow should be interwoven, appreciate and work for equality and accept that real wealth is in social capital and not in accumulated goods or bigger bank balances.

So again it will be about who you know, but in this case it will be your neighbours and your immediate community and, importantly, what they know about living in a low-energy and sustainable way.

It’s not about money rather, it’s about a rich social capital in which the wealth of the community will be measured by the fertility of relationships.

America presently faces a dilemma evolving from a dynamic built around materialism, accumulation, individualism and inequality and, subsequently, is troubled by a US$14 trillion public debt.

America has, along with most of the developed world, enriched itself courtesy of easily accessible, cheap and finite fossil fuels, but now the debt is being called in and the country is unable, it appears, to erode its arrears.

Most other countries are in a similar position, having used nature’s bounty for frivolities, rather than building tight-knit, resourceful, self-reliant communities that put social capital ahead of the rude, and often violent, scramble for economic riches.