Social Capital Management. A Case Study of the Town of Racibórz

Robert Geisler

University of Opole
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0218-980X

Michał Potracki

University of Opole
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2842-7167

Abstract

For many years, social capital has been the subject of research in various areas and social environments. What is worth diagnosing is not so much its functioning or formation, but its management, i.e. deliberate development aimed at achieving individual or collective benefits. The cultural borderland region of the Racibórz area, especially the town, is a good case for an analysis of such phenomena, because, over the centuries, the town has been part of various administrative and economic regimes and thus has developed forms of social capital independent of state structures. The main research questions in this paper are the following: What remains of them today? Are they subject to management processes?

Keywords:

border areas, borderlands, social capital, public management, local development