Symposium Social Capital and Diversity
Social Capital and Racial Inequality
in America
By Rodney E. Hero
“Social capital” is said to be strongly associated with better sub-
stantive outcomes as well as with civic and economic dimensions
of equality in the United States. Robert Putnam argues in
Bowling Alone that “the American states with the highest levels of
social capital are precisely the states most characterized by eco-
nomic and civic equality.” He adds: “[B]oth across space [i.e.,
states] and across time, equality and fraternity [social capital] are
strongly positively correlated. . . . [T]he empirical evidence on
recent trends is unambiguous. . . . Community and equality are
mutually reinforcing, not mutually incompatible.”1
Yet in seeming contradiction to this “social capital thesis,”
social capital and related factors such as “political culture” do not
necessarily bridge across racial or ethnic groups; nor do they
always engender relative civic and economic equality between
blacks and whites. Even more problematic, higher aggregate
social capital is sometimes associated with relatively worse out-
comes for racial minorities.2 These results underscore the impor-
tance of racial/ethnic dimensions of equality in the United States
and reveal major limitations of the social-capital thesis.
Most analyses of social capital do not adequately confront con-
ditions associated with race; as a result, they come to conclusions
more benign than a fuller assessment warrants. Social-capital
analyses implicitly emphasize absolute or aggregate indicators of
equality and overlook or understate relative outcomes for minori-
ties. They thus obscure important dimensions of the continuing
inequality by race and mislead us in our thinking about equality
and democracy in American politics. The appropriate assessment
of social capital’s impact on American civil society and politics
shows that it depends on what dimensions of public life we con-
sider, how we define “better off,” whether one is black or white,
and whether one lives in a more or less racially heterogeneous
community.3
Rodney E. Hero is the Packey J. Dee Professor of American
Democracy and chair of the Department of Political Science at the
University of Notre Dame (Rodney.Hero.1@nd.edu). He special-
izes in U.S. democracy and politics, especially as viewed through the
analytical lenses of Latino and ethnic/minority politics, state/urban
politics, and federalism. His book Faces of Inequality: Social
Diversity in American Politics received the American Political
Science Association’s 1999 Woodrow Wilson Foundation Award.
Arguments and Evidence
In Bowling Alone, Putnam created a “social capital index” (for
1990), which serves as his major explanatory (independent) vari-
able concerning the contemporary importance of social capital.
The index has five components and 14 specific variables, meas-
uring community organizational life, engagement in public
affairs, community volunteerism, informal sociability, and social
trust.4 This index, along with the numerous dependent variables
examined in the study, does not disaggregate along racial or eth-
nic lines, although it includes race as a separate independent vari-
able. How does our understanding change if we inspect the
social-capital thesis more directly through the lens of racial diver-
sity, in various arenas of politics and policy?
To begin, I examined the 1990 social-capital index for the
American states (see Putnam’s Web site, www.bowlingalone.com)
and its relationship to a measure of state “minority diversity” (i.e.,
percent black, Latino, and Asian, in 1990).5 I found a negative
and substantially strong relationship: r = −0.585 (adjusted
R2 = 0.33 to 0.43). (The strength of this relationship depends on
whether you use a “squared term” to capture an upward swing in
the regression line.6) More minority diversity is related to less
aggregate social capital; less diversity is related to higher social
capital. Indeed, a third or more of social capital appears related to
racial/ethnic diversity.7 In short, states with high social capital
tend to be relatively homogeneous in racial or ethnic terms.8 For
example, the Dakotas and Minnesota have high social-capital
scores.
Putnam’s index of civic equality is “based on class differences in
rates of political participation, as measured in Roper Social and
Political Trends surveys, aggregated over 1974 to 1994. For each
of the twelve forms of political participation—signing petitions,
attending public meetings, and so on”—he constructed a “ratio
of the logged incidence in the top quintile of the income distri-
bution to the bottom quintile of the income distribution.”9
Putnam finds a strong relationship between social capital and
civic equality—the more social capital, the more civic equality.10
But the civic-equality index, like the one for social capital, is not
disaggregated according to race.
Nearly all the measures used in the civic-equality index come
from surveys; and given the size and distribution of racial/ethnic
populations in the United States, appropriate survey evidence is
likely not available or even feasible across the 50 states. Other
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Symposium Social Capital and Diversity

indicators of organizational activity also do not distinguish by the
racial/ethnic backgrounds of participants. This gap in data con-
strains a full examination of civic equality relative to race.
Nonetheless, census data for voter registration and turnout—
drawn from the Current Population Survey (CPS) of the U.S.
Census Bureau—are illuminating since “the voting population is
the closest match in racial and ethnic terms to the population as
a whole.”11 So if social capital is indeed strongly linked to civic
equality, as the social-capital thesis asserts, the connection should
appear in voting. I will therefore examine racial civic equality
using two CPS indicators, registration and turnout, among the
eligible population for 1992, 1994, and 1996.
Civic Equality: Ratios
Registration ratios
Is social capital significantly related to more equal black/white
voter registration ratios in the states? No. The bivariate relation-
ships between social capital and black/white registration ratios are
all negative and statistically significant, as shown in Table 1,
Models 1, 3, and 5. Within each state, higher aggregate social cap-
ital is associated with larger gaps between black and white regis-
tration. There is also no support for the claim that social capital is
positively related to more equal ratios after controlling for other
factors that affect voter registration, such as minority diversity,
black poverty, or both (see Table 1, Models 2, 4, and 6).12 Indeed,
for one of the three years, the relationships continue to be negative
and significant even after accounting for other factors.
Turnout ratios
Social capital also does not go along with more equal
black/white voter turnout ratios in the states. The bivariate rela-
tionship (in Table 2, see Models 1, 3, and 5) between social cap-
ital and black/white turnout is negative for all three years; and
for two of the years it is significant. In the same two years, high-
er levels of social capital are associated with larger gaps in vot-
ing turnout between blacks and whites even when I control for
minority diversity and black poverty (in Table 2, see Models 2,
4, and 6).
In short, civic equality (i.e., the ratio of black to white registra-
tion and turnout) is lower in states with high aggregate levels of
capital. It is also lower in states with high aggregate levels of civic
culture, according to another set of analyses not reported here.13
The authoritative story of political participation by Sidney Verba,
Kay Scholzman, and Henry Brady14 similarly shows that we
should not expect to find more racial equality in other political
activities, but might well find even less.15 Social capital is associ-
ated with lower, not higher, relative civic equality regarding race.
Economic Equality: Ratios
Putnam’s Gini index of economic inequality, like his civic-equality
measure, does not differentiate by racial groups within states.
However, census data on per capita income and poverty levels, by
racial/ethnic groups and within the states, are available. I use these
data (for 1990) to examine racial/ethnic “economic equality.”
Here too, substantial evidence of racial differentiation appears;
virtually no evidence supports the social-capital thesis, and much
contradicts it.
Poverty ratios
Is social capital positively (and significantly) related to better
black/white poverty ratios? No. The relationship is negative and
weakly significant; states with higher levels of overall social cap-
ital show a somewhat greater disparity between levels of black

Table 1
Social Capital with Racial Civic Equality: Voter Registration Ratios, within States
Dependent Variable: Black/White Voter Registration Ratio
1992 1994 1996
Independent
Variables Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4 Model 5 Model 6
Social Capital −.121** −.0689 −.1125**** −.0686** −.0903** −.0122
(.0487) (.0597) (.0257) (.0324) (.0376) (.0428)
Minority .0958 .3281** .6038***
Diversity (.2008) (.1432) (.1822)
Black Poverty .0066* .0017 .0025
Rates (.0038) (.0027) (.0036)
Constant .8623**** .6435**** .8406**** .6805**** .8711**** .5988****
(.0296) (.1518) (.0193) (.1147) (.0275) (.139)
Adj. R2 .16 .195 .298 .349 .102 .265
N 28 28 44 44 43 43
*Significant at .1 level, **significant at .05, ***significant at .01, ****significant at .001, two-tailed tests. (Standard errors in parentheses.)
Note: The Census Bureau does not provide data for all 50 states. States with sparse populations are more likely to be excluded. Data
beyond 1996 were available but not employed, because of their distance in time from the 1990 social-capital index and social-diversity
measures.

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 Table 2
Social Capital with Racial Civic Equality: Voter Turnout Ratios, within States
Dependent Variable: Black/White Voter Turnout Ratio
1992 1994 1996
Independent
Variables Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4 Model 5 Model 6
Social Capital −.1497*** −.1255** −.0892*** −.0708* −.0368 .0493
(.0451) (.058) (.028) (.0373) (.0432) (.0496)
Minority .0692 .14 .6691***
Diversity (.1951) (.1647) (.2116)
Black Poverty .0027 .0006 .0025
Rates (.0037) (.0034) (.0042)
Constant .7862**** .6848**** .7362**** .672**** .8575**** .5623****
(.0274) (.1475) (.021) (.132) (.0316) (.1614)
Adj. R2 .120 .228 .176 .15 −.007 .159
N 28 28 44 44 43 43
*Significant at .1 level, **significant at .05, ***significant at .01, ****significant at .001, two-tailed tests. (Standard errors in parentheses.)

poverty and white poverty. When one controls for the index of
minority diversity, the relationship remains negative but is no
longer statistically significant (data not shown in table form).
Per capita income ratios
Unlike poverty ratios, social capital is positively and significantly
related (at p = 0.001) to black/white per capita income ratios.
That is, in states with higher levels of social capital, the income of
the average black resident is relatively similar to the income of the
average white resident.16 This is the first piece of evidence consis-
tent with the social-capital thesis. However, states’ level of minori-
ty diversity itself has a negative and weakly significant relationship
(p = −0.10) to per capita income ratios; in other words, the more
diverse the state, the greater the distance between black and white
average incomes. A pattern of more equitable per capita income
ratios but not more equitable black/white poverty ratios associated
with higher social capital may suggest black economic polarization.
That is, on average blacks enjoy greater equality with whites in
states with high levels of social capital—but in those same states, a
higher proportion of African Americans are poor.
It is not clear whether more equal income leads to more social
capital, or the reverse. Social-capital analyses are ambiguous on
this point, saying only that the patterns “go together.”17 These
complexities and ambiguities suggest that the relationship
between social class and social capital is more complicated than
we have realized up until now.
Civic Equality: Rates
Ratios of the type I have been exploring up to this point are
most appropriate for examining relative patterns of equality
within states. However, because the ratios are themselves prod-
ucts of the rates for minorities divided by the rates for whites,
extreme (very high or very low) rates for either group will affect
the overall ratios. For this reason, and because there are many
ways to think about the concept of “equality,” some observers
argue for examining the racial-group patterns (blacks compared
to blacks, and whites compared to whites)—that is, rates across
states—rather than comparing blacks to whites within a given
state.
Both types of measurement are valuable. On the one hand,
because “community” is presumably more plausible within states,
the within-state (ratio) comparison is arguably the most fitting
for examining racial/ethnic equality. Additionally, states exercise
the major police power and domestic policy responsibilities in the
U.S. federal system that are among the most relevant to equality
concerns. On the other hand, group comparisons across states are
fruitful since they recast debates about race and (in)equality into
a more directly nation-centered rather than state-centered per-
spective on American society. I move, then, to the question of
whether overall levels of social capital are associated with differ-
ent outcomes for each racial group from one state to another. I
address this in Table 3 and subsequent tables.
Registration rates
High levels of social capital do not go along with high rates of
black voter registration across states. In the bivariate case, all
three relationships are negative and one is significant.18
Multivariate analysis that includes controls for a state’s black
population percentage and black poverty rates shows only a
weak (nonsignificant) positive relationship. But social capital is
significantly related to white voter registration rates; the bivari-
ate and multivariate relationships for all three years are strongly
positive and significant (data not shown).19 In this arena, whites
benefit, compared with other members of their race, from living
in a state with high levels of social capital. Blacks do not; in fact,
they may even be harmed (in comparison with other blacks).
Turnout rates
Overall, there is a slightly positive relationship between social cap-
ital and levels of black turnout, as Table 4 shows. The bivariate

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Table 3
Social Capital with Black Voter Registration Rates, across States
Dependent Variable: Black Voter Registration Rate
1992 1994 1996
Independent
Variables Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4 Model 5 Model 6
Social Capital −5.484 4.339 −3.318* .3171 −3.329 .6792
(3.883) (5.668) (1.874) (2.547) (2.522) (3.49)
Percent Black .3299 .3364 .4037
Population (.318) (.2099) (.2805)
Black Poverty .7914*** .3001 .1764
Rates (.2395) (.2037) (.2592)
Constant 62.629**** 37.151**** 55.75**** 43.484**** 60.56**** 51.303****
(2.354) (7.55) (1.41) (6.177) (1.845) (7.818)
Adj. R2 .036 .311 .047 .124 .017 .041
N 28 28 44 44 43 43
*Significant at .1 level, **significant at .05, ***significant at .01, ****significant at .001, two-tailed tests. (Standard errors in parentheses.)

relationship in 1992 is negative and weakly significant; in all
other models except one, bivariate or multivariate, the relation-
ship is positive but not significant. The relationship between
social capital and the black turnout rate for 1996 is positive and
weakly significant after accounting for black population and black
poverty.20
Social capital is more strongly related to white voter turnout
rates in the bivariate and multivariate cases; the relationships for
all three years are positive and significant (data not shown). Thus,
when we compare across states within a given race, we see that
black rates of registration or turnout are seldom significantly
more equal where there is higher aggregate social capital, even
though the rates for whites are.
This evidence on registration and turnout ratios and rates for
blacks and whites strongly implies that the civic equality identi-
fied in studies of social capital is the result of high(er) levels for
whites. Thus there is strong reason to wonder if findings that a
sense of community is strongly related to civic equality are
largely owing to patterns in states with large white populations
and small minority populations. That is, the finding that civic
equality is associated with social capital appears to be an artifact
of white social capital and white civic participation, and perhaps
of relative racial homogeneity in a number of states. By not dis-
aggregating along racial lines, social-capital analyses incorrectly
make strong, broad claims about the dynamics of equalization
while masking what may be a situation of racial inequality. As

Table 4
Social Capital with Black Voter Turnout Rates, across States
Dependent Variable: Black Voter Turnout Rate
1992 1994 1996
Independent
Variables Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4 Model 5 Model 6
Social Capital −5.158* 1.634 .8462 2.286 2.039 6.4204*
(3.026) (5.015) (1.653) (2.365) (2.508) (3.458)
Percent Black .3227 .1978 .4938*
Population (.2814) (.1949) (.2568)
Black Poverty .3485 −.1151 .0095
Rates (.2119) (.1891) (.2568)
Constant 52.047**** 39.035**** 35.695**** 37.066**** 49.686**** 44.396****
(1.835) (6.68) (1.243) (5.734) (1.835) (7.748)
Adj. R2 .066 .14 −.018 −.037 −.008 .023
N 28 28 44 44 43 43
*Significant at .1 level, **significant at .05, ***significant at .01, ****significant at .001, two-tailed tests. (Standard errors in parentheses.)

116 March 2003 Vol. 1/No. 1

Verba, Schlozman, and Brady put it in their analysis of volun-
tary activity in American politics, “the public’s voice is often
loud, sometimes clear, but rarely equal.”21 They too point to race
(along with income) as a crucial element in this pattern of polit-
ical inequality.
Economic Equality: Rates
Poverty rates
Let us turn now to rates of economic inequality within race and
across states. Social capital is related to black poverty rates; the
bivariate relationship is negative and significant for 1990
(p = 0.01). In other words, black poverty rates are lower (better)
in states where there is more aggregate social capital—a finding
consistent with the social-capital thesis. But this inverse rela-
tionship between social capital and the black poverty rate does
not hold up when the percent black in a state is controlled.
Social capital is not related to white poverty rates (results not
shown here); in the bivariate case, there is a weakly negative,
insignificant relationship, which is similar in the multivariate
case.
Per capita income rates
As social capital in a state increases, black per capita income
increases slightly in that state in comparison to black incomes in
other states; this weak, insignificant relationship also holds after
controlling for the percent of the population that is black. If
we compare civic culture with black per capita income, we find
a positive relationship that is in fact statistically significant
(p = 0.001); it remains after controlling for percentage of black
population in a state (at p = 0.05). The average income of whites
in a state declines as social capital increases (not shown here),
even after controlling for black population.22
Because of the issue of murky causality, it is difficult to inter-
pret these findings on the connections between social capital (or
civic culture) and poverty or income. Which comes first in a
state—lower rates of black poverty or slightly higher rates of black
income, or higher levels of social capital? Do well-off blacks move
into states with active communities; or do states with active com-
munities work harder to reduce levels of black poverty (but not
white)? We do not know. Furthermore, different indicators of
community—social capital rather than civic culture—produce
somewhat different findings; hence, the specific operationaliza-
tion and measurement of social capital and of community mat-
ters more than it should.23
As I noted at the beginning of this article, Putnam and others
have found clear evidence that “American states with the highest
levels of social capital are precisely the states most characterized
by economic . . . equality.” But my findings have complicated
that picture. Perhaps earlier findings on income distribution—
based on Gini coefficients, which speak to social class but not
directly to racial (in)equality—may be attributable to white pat-
terns. That seems especially likely since economic equality as
measured by Gini coefficients tends to be highest in racially
homogeneous states.24 At a minimum, when looked at through
a racial lens, the reality is substantially more complicated than
studies have recognized.
Examining Substantive Equality
The social-capital thesis asserts that when the United States has
more social capital, and in states with high levels of social capi-
tal, there are boosts in child welfare and educational perform-
ance, safe and productive neighborhoods, economic prosperity,
and health and happiness. For example, “kids are better off in
high social capital states,” “schools work better in high social
capital states,” and “mortality is lower in high social capital
states.”25
Do these strong claims (that better substantive outcomes are
associated with higher levels of social capital) hold when we
examine relative, i.e., minority-to-white, indicators rather than
absolute or aggregate measures? To address this question, I creat-
ed relative or disaggregated indicators somewhat similar to previ-
ous research26 and considered the indicators in relation to the
social-capital index. These indicators address minority or black
patterns (as specified in the individual analyses) and white pat-
ters, with the former divided by the latter to create the ratios. The
information for the ratios, concerning education outcomes,
incarceration, and infant mortality, are drawn from Department
of Education data and from census data. The full analysis
includes three approaches: (1) OLS regression, (2) robust regres-
sion, and (3) a regression analysis that removes states with partic-
ularly small minority populations, which might distort find-
ings.27 The substantive results from each type of analysis are
essentially similar; so rather than present all of them here, I dis-
cuss the findings in a general way and present only the OLS
regressions in Tables 5 and 6.
Substantive Equality: Ratios
On the whole, the results here resemble those we found earlier
regarding voter registration and turnout: higher levels of social
capital do not go along with more equality in outcomes between
minorities (or blacks) and whites. Instead, the data indicate
worse relative outcomes for minorities (or for blacks alone, in
the case of incarceration patterns: see explanation below) on
three of four indicators. The pattern generally holds across the
several types of regression analyses, and with or without controls
for levels of minority diversity in states. This evidence starkly
contradicts the social-capital thesis, much as the civic-equality
ratios did.
Minority school graduation ratios
The gap between graduation rates for minorities and whites is
greater in states with high levels of social capital, with or with-
out controls for the level of minority diversity and/or black
poverty rates within states.28 Table 5.a. shows the results. These
findings, although surprising from the standpoint of the social-
capital thesis, are largely consistent with previous findings of
“social diversity” analyses of political culture.29
Minority school suspension ratios
The gap between minority and Anglo suspension rates is, simi-
larly, higher in states with high levels of social capital, as Table 5.a.
shows. The pattern holds with or without controls for levels
of black poverty rates, but not after controlling for minority
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Table 5
Minority Outcomes, Ratios, and Social Capital
5.a. Dependent Variables: Minority/White Graduation and Suspension Ratios
Minority/White Graduation Ratios Minority/White Suspension Ratios
Controlling for Controlling for
Minority Diversity Minority Diversity
Bivariate and Black Poverty Bivariate and Black Poverty
Independent Variables Model 1 OLS Model 2 OLS Model 1 OLS Model 2 OLS
Social Capital −.0496*** −.0472* .266* .2702
(.0179) (.0247) (.1352) (.181)
Minority Diversity .042 −.5377
(.1033) (.758)
Black Poverty Rates −.0008 .0211
(.0021) (.0151)
Constant .8022**** .813**** 2.008**** 1.577***
(.0138) (.075) (.1045) (.5507)
Adj. R2 .125 .094 .058 .078
N 48 48 48 48
*Significant at .1 level, **significant at .05, ***significant at .01, ****significant at .001, two-tailed tests. (Standard errors in parentheses.)

diversity alone or when diversity and black poverty are both con-
sidered. Civic culture is not significantly related to minority-
to-white suspension ratios, either in the bivariate case or in the
multivariate case.
Black incarceration ratios
Table 5.b. shows black-to-white incarceration ratios. (In this case,
data on Hispanics are imprecise because Hispanics are catego-
rized as “other,” and it is not clear how many people in the cate-
gory of “other” are not Hispanic—e.g., Asian American or Native
American. Therefore, I focus only on non-Hispanic blacks and
non-Hispanic whites.) Clearly, states with high levels of social
capital show worse relative outcomes for blacks; this pattern per-
sists even when controlling for levels of minority diversity and/or
black poverty.30 It also persists when community is measured by
levels of civic culture.
Minority infant mortality ratios
Unlike for three previous indicators, the relative gap between
minorities and whites with regard to infant mortality does not rise

5.b. Dependent Variables: Black/White Incarceration and Minority Infant Mortality Ratios
Black/White Incarceration Ratios Minority/White Infant Mortality Ratios
Controlling for Controlling for
Minority Diversity Minority Diversity
Bivariate and Black Poverty Bivariate and Black Poverty
Independent Variables Model 1 OLS Model 2 OLS Model 1 OLS Model 2 OLS
Social Capital 2.127*** 2.504** −.0705 −.1201
(.7111) (.9413) (.1037) (.1249)
Minority Diversity .5535 −.5804
(3.941) (.5716)
Black Poverty Rates .0911 .0109
(.0785) (.0126)
Constant 8.446**** 5.652* 1.683**** 1.558***
(.5357) (2.873) (.0759) (.4881)
Adj. R2 .147 .135 −.014 .015
N 47 47 40 40
*Significant at .1 level, **significant at .05, ***significant at .01, ****significant at .001, two-tailed tests. (Standard errors in parentheses.)

118 March 2003 Vol. 1/No. 1

as social capital within a state rises (see Table 5.b.), nor does it fall.
There is no statistically significant relationship here.31 Nor is there
when civic culture is substituted for social capital as the indepen-
dent variable. Perhaps federal government programs—such as
Medicare, WIC (Women, Infants, and Children), and others—
play a substantial role in lessening disparities in this dimension of
policy, unlike in public schooling or incarceration, which are main-
ly affected by states’ policy choices.
In sum, higher social capital in a state is not associated with
better relative substantive outcomes for racial minorities. Instead,
these outcomes are sometimes worse in states with high(er) levels
of social capital, even after accounting for the proportion of
minority population and their poverty rates. Earlier findings of
better overall outcomes in high social capital states result from a
focus on absolute or aggregate measures, including the outcomes
for the large nonminority populations in relatively homogeneous
states. These outcomes contrast substantially with those of the
minority populations.
Substantive Equality: Rates
As with the discussion of civic and economic equality, I turn now
from a focus on ratios of racial minorities compared to whites
within a state, to rates of inequality within a race across states; the
essential findings follow in Table 6.
Minority school graduation rates
Graduation rates for minorities clearly improve as aggregate
social capital increases; this is true in the bivariate as well as the
multivariate cases, which control for levels of diversity and black
poverty rates (see Table 6.a.). This impressively supports the
social-capital thesis and is reaffirmed when civic culture is sub-
stituted for the social-capital measure.
Minority school suspension rates
In strong contrast to the findings for minority graduation rates,
minority school suspension rates are significantly higher (much
worse) in states where there is more aggregate social capital. This
is so in the bivariate analysis, after accounting for the size of either
minority populations or black poverty rates, or after accounting
for both (see Table 6.a.). The measure of civic culture also shows
higher rates of suspension for minorities in states with a greater
civic culture. Together, these contrasting findings on graduation
and suspension might indicate economic polarization within the
minority population, a finding in keeping with the earlier discus-
sion of poverty and ratios of per capita income.32
Black incarceration rates
Black incarceration rates are no less or more disparate where there
is higher aggregate social capital, in the bivariate case or in the
multivariate case (see Table 6.b.). However, they are higher
(worse) when you control for levels of minority diversity alone
and combined with black poverty rates in the robust regression
analysis (data not shown); and the relationship with the civic-cul-
ture indicator is quite similar when controls are introduced. To
the extent that black incarceration rates are higher in states where
there is more aggregate social capital, the data are not consistent
with the social-capital thesis’ claims about equality; but on this
measure, the data tell an ambiguous story.
Minority infant mortality rates
The relationship between social capital and minority infant mor-
tality rates is not statistically significant in the bivariate case.
However, infant mortality rates among minorities may be lower
(better) where there is more social capital, if you account for lev-
els of minority diversity either alone or together with black pover-
ty rates (see Table 6.b.). The civic-culture measure produces

Table 6
Minority Outcomes, Rates, and Social Capital
6.a. Dependent Variable: Minority Graduation and Suspension Rates
Minority Graduation Rates Minority Suspension Rates
Controlling for Controlling for
Minority Diversity Minority Diversity
Bivariate and Black Poverty Bivariate and Black Poverty
Independent Variables Model 1 OLS Model 4 OLS Model 1 OLS Model 4 OLS
Social Capital 10.291**** 7.967**** .692**** .701****
(1.266) (1.35) (.1165) (.1601)
Minority Diversity −1.337 −.0902
(5.652) (.6708)
Black Poverty Rates −.6106**** .0064
(.1129) (.0138)
Constant 68.832**** 86.748**** 2.07**** 1.918****
(.9787) (4.107) (.0907) (.4936)
Adj. R2 .581 .74 .427 .404
N 48 48 47 47
*Significant at .1 level, **significant at .05, ***significant at .01, ****significant at .001, two-tailed tests. (Standard errors in parentheses.)

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6.b. Dependent Variable: Black Incarceration and Minority Infant Mortality Rates
Black Incarceration Rates Minority Infant Mortality Rates
Controlling for Controlling for
Minority Diversity Minority Diversity
Bivariate and Black Poverty Bivariate and Black Poverty
Independent Variables Model 1 OLS Model 4 OLS Model 1 OLS Model 4 OLS
Social Capital .5231 1.614 −1.168 −1.624*
(.9371) (1.221) (.7673) (.8849)
Minority Diversity 8.424 −5.605
(5.113) (4.049)
Black Poverty .0102 .1231
Rates (.1018) (.0892)
Constant 12.344**** 9.337** 13.12**** 11.4***
(.706) (3.727) (.5614) (3.458)
Adj. R2 −.015 .002 .033 .139
N 47 47 40 40
*Significant at .1 level, **significant at .05, ***significant at .01, ****significant at .001, two-tailed tests. (Standard errors in parentheses.)

roughly similar findings when controls are added. Here, social
capital is associated with positive outcomes.
The outcomes with regard to rates are sometimes, but not
always, consistent with social-capital claims. Minority graduation
rates are higher where there is higher social capital, but minority
suspension rates are also higher. Rates of infant mortality among
minorities, however, are lower in states with high levels of social
capital. The minority graduation rates, in combination with the
suspension and incarceration rates, indicate that social capital
may have facilitative effects for some people of color and sub-
stantial social-control effects for other people of color.33 If these
arguments are correct, they importantly amend the social-capital
thesis.
Summary and Conclusions
The social-capital thesis has deeply influenced thinking about
community, equality, and democracy in the United States and
around the world. But social-capital studies understate the
importance of race and ethnicity in their conceptualization and
analyses. They focus almost entirely on aggregate outcomes and
absolute gains. However, race—as well as ethnicity and class—is
fundamental in defining American “community” and in under-
standing American civil society. Social capital and civic culture
are negatively and substantially related to racial and ethnic diver-
sity in the states; thus, the “bridging” extolled in states with high
social capital is more limited than most analyses have recognized.
The pattern in high social-capital settings that are relatively
racially homogeneous may be better characterized as “bounded
bridging,” or “biased bonding.”
Similarly, the evidence on civic equality and substantive equal-
ity ratios suggests no support for—and often directly contra-
dicts—the implied claims of the social-capital thesis. I found lit-
tle evidence that racial equality on civic or substantive dimensions
is associated with more aggregate social capital. It is primarily for
economic equality across the races that some support for the
social-capital thesis is indicated. Nevertheless, to the extent that
more community in the aggregate is associated with more eco-
nomic equality, that association occurs only or mostly in the
white population and/or around social-class issues.
Configurations of social capital are clearly complicated and
need to be better understood before we accept them as having
generally benevolent consequences. In some ways, community
may be as much a problem as it is a solution for a host of social
and political concerns in American civil society. For instance,
Putnam has noted a “. . . risk that emphasizing community exac-
erbates division and exclusion. Since social capital is inevitably
easier to foster within homogeneous communities, emphasis on its
creation may inadvertently shift the balance away from bridging
social capital and toward bonding social capital.”34 Perhaps there
is a deep tension between diversity and connectedness, or
between having a community of people who are likely to express
very divergent viewpoints and having a community of people
who are likely to participate effectively in shared democratic deci-
sion making.
The findings in this article also raise normative and theoretical
questions about whether we should think about racial-group
equality within or across states, since different understandings of
equality are implied by each choice. In assessing American insti-
tutions, it matters whether the federal polity is considered from
more nation-centered or state-centered perspectives, because the
identification and nature of “problems” and potential “solutions”
are likely to be defined and addressed differently. And how should
African Americans judge a state in which there is greater racial
inequality but also a higher floor, as compared with a state in
which blacks are on average poorer or less politically active but
not so dissimilar to whites?

120 March 2003 Vol. 1/No. 1

Figure 1
Scatterplots: Social Capital and Registration and Turnout Ratios (1994, 1996)
Most generally, we must appreciate the complexity of
American equality. A more complete, more fitting understanding
of American community, and of its presumed democratic and
egalitarian aspirations, is likely to emerge when we theoretically
and empirically integrate that complexity into our thinking,
scholarship, and public-policy discourse.
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Notes
1 Putnam 2000, 358–63 (emphasis in original) and chap-
ter 22 more generally; also see Rice and Sumberg 1997.
2 Cf. Meier et al. 1989 and Meier and Stewart 1991; addi-
tionally, see examinations of race and “political culture,”
such as Hero and Tolbert 1996 and Hero 1998, which
also find detrimental consequences.
3 Putnam’s most recent work demonstrates that he has
reached the same conclusion, largely from surveys and
analyses conducted after he completed Bowling Alone. See
his Web site, www.bowlingalone.com, for new data and
arguments.
4 Putnam 2000, 291, chapters 16–22.
5 Hero 1998, 12.
6 There is also a strong relationship with the Rice and Sum-
berg 1997 measure of “civic culture” (a concept that is quite
similar to social capital): r = -0.560, which was created sepa-
rately from, but closely parallel to, the social-capital index.
The relationship of the social-capital index with the civic-
culture indicator is r = 0.818, cf. Putnam 2000, 495, n. 49.
7 Cf. Hero 1998, 9–14; Hero and Tolbert 1996 for similar
findings concerning social diversity and “political culture”;
Elazar 1972, 1984.
8 Putnam 2000; Rice and Sumberg 1997, 106–7.
122 March 2003 Vol. 1/No. 1
9 Putnam 2000, 497, emphasis added, and 359.
10 Putnam 2000, 359–61.
11 Verba et al. 1995, 237; also see chapter 8 more generally,
and passim.
12 In general, when I discuss issues of civic or economic
equality—voter registration and turnout, poverty rates,
etc.—I refer to blacks and whites. When discussing out-
comes such as graduation and infant mortality, I refer to
minorities and whites. (Incarceration is an exception here;
the data are on blacks and whites.)
13 Moreover, essentially the same patterns occur when a
“civic culture” measure (developed in Rice and Sumberg
1997)—a similar yet different indicator of community
that correlates highly with the “social capital” index—is
examined with registration ratios.
14 Verba et al. 1995.
15 Hero et al. 2002. Evidence (from 1996 and 2000) on
other forms of political participation corroborates these
findings.
16 The same pattern holds if one compares Rice and Sum-
berg’s measure of civic culture to income ratios.
17 Putnam 2000; cf. Tarrow 1996.
18 And one sees essentially the same findings when the civic-
culture measure is substituted for the social-capital
indicator.
19 Similar, although somewhat weaker, relationships material-
ize when you substitute the civic-culture measure (data
not shown) for the social-capital indicator.
20 But this relationship does not hold when you substitute
the civic-culture measure of community for the social-
capital indicator.
21 Verba et al. 1995, 509, emphasis added.
22 Yet with the same controls, civic culture and white per
capita income are positively and significantly related.
23 Cf. Putnam 2000; Rice and Sumberg 1997.
24 See Putnam 2000, 360.
25 Putnam 2000, 298, 300, 330.
26 Hero and Tolbert 1996; also see Hero 1998; cf. Radcliff
and Saiz 1995.
27 The latter two approaches account for outliers or extreme
cases.
28 Cf. Putnam 2000, chapter 17, especially 297–98; see
Table 5.a. This pattern holds, and is actually more pro-
nounced, when the civic-culture measure replaces the
social-capital measure of community.
29 Hero 1998, 91–2; cf. Meier et al. 1989 and Meier and
Stewart 1991.
30 Cf. Putnam 2000, chapter 18; Hero 1998, 105–7.
31 Cf. Putnam 2000, 297, 328; cf. Hero 1998, 99–100.
32 Cf. Hochschild 1995; Dawson 1994.
33 Edelman 1967; Smith 1993.
34 Putnam 2000, 400, all emphases added.