Local Nets and Social Capital

1
Local Nets and Social Capital

• Duncan Timms, Sara Ferlander Liz Timms,
• CRDLT,
• Faculty of Human Sciences,
• University of Stirling

2
SCHEMA Social Cohesion through Higher Education
in Marginal Areas

• Project funded under the EC 4th Framework
  Educational Multimedia Taskforce
• Co-ordinated by the University of Stirling
• Partners in Finland (Lapland Oulu), Germany
  (Stuttgart Bremen) and Sweden (Örebro
  Stockholm)

3
Project Aims

• Use of a client-server topology for the delivery
  and support of online courses
• Exploration of Web-based learning environment
• Production of CPD courses for health and welfare
  workers in remote areas
• Research into relationship between on-line
  networks and local communities

4
Achievements

• NCs/set-top boxes - feasible but timing and
  economic problems
• Web-based environments - Reports on packages for
  collaboration online
• CPD Modules - modules developed for health
  welfare workers (units on applied social research
  methods, social implications of the Internet,
  care for dementia sufferers, drug and alcohol
  abuse, quality management in care provision,
  community portraits)
• Research into links between learning communities,
  local nets and local communities

5
Local Nets and Social Capital

• Local Net - locally-based computer network
  dealing with local issues
• Social Capital - extent of networks, trust and
  sense of belonging

FOR MORE INFO...

• See article on Local Nets and Social
  Capital in autumn issue of Telematics and
  Informatics.

6
General Research Question

• To what extent can the use of CIT (re-)create
  Social Cohesion in Local Communities?
• Specific Research Questions
• To what extent can the use of Web-based packages
  lead to the creation of Learning Communities?
• To what extent can Learning Communities help in
  the recreation of local communities?
• What is the impact of Local Nets?

7
The Existing Wisdom - CIT as a Threat to Social
Capital

• The Digital Divide?
• The seductive antisocial power of the Internet
• Just as TV produces couch potatoes, so online
  culture produces mouse potatoes, people who hide
  from real life and spend their whole life goofing
  off in cyberspace.
• 
  (McClelland, 1994 10)

8
The Existing Wisdom - CIT as a Vehicle for
Increased Interaction

• People in virtual communities exchange
  pleasantries and argue, engage in intellectual
  discourse, conduct commerce, exchange knowledge,
  share emotional support, make plans, brainstorm,
  gossip, fall in love, find friends and lose them,
  play games, flirt, create a little high art and a
  lot of idle talk. People in virtual communities
  do just about everything people do in real life,
  but we leave our bodies behind. You cant kiss
  anybody and nobody can punch you in the nose, but
  a lot can happen within these boundaries
• (Rheingold, 1993 3)

9
The Existing Wisdom - The Web and Empowerment

• On the Internet, nobody knows youre a dog
• people whose physical handicaps make it
  difficult to form new friendships find that
  virtual communities treat them as they have
  always wanted to be treated - as thinkers and
  transmitters of ideas, not carnal vessels with a
  certain appearance and way of walking and talking
  (or not walking and talking). (Rheingold)
• when they connect people electronic networks are
  social networks. (Wellman)

10
The Community Net Research Project

• Identification of two marginalised communities
  with local net projects
• Establishing the base survey of social capital
  prior to connection
• Action research involving use of Community
  Portraits module
• Follow-up surveys

11

• The Two Areas

12
Community Portraits

• Pilot in Spring 1999 designed to investigate use
  of online collaboration between members of
  different HW professions in different
  communities (remote areas of Finland, Germany and
  Scotland)
• Extension now to members of marginalised
  com-munities themselves. How can web-based
  collaborative learning contribute to community
  building?
• For further information on the Community
  Portraits module contact Liz Timms in the
  Department of Social Work, University of
  Edinburgh (elizabeth.timms_at_ed.ac.uk)

13
Research Aims

• What is the extent of social capital in the
  com-munity prior to the development of the local
  net?
• Once the net is installed, who are users and who
  is left out?
• What are peoples expectations for the Local Net?
• Can Learning Communities bridge the divide
  between different groups?

14
Initial Survey Results (Sweden)

• High numbers of single parents, migrants
• Low social capital
• Internal divisions lack of identity
• CIT seen as a vehicle for increasing cohesion

15
(No Transcript)
16
Expected Use of the Local Net

• Both Local and Global services (importance of
  local information)
• Use of the Local Net thought likely to increase
  social capital in the community
• increased information (substitute for local
  paper)
• increased contacts (especially with officials)
• stronger sense of local identity
• but less optimism about its impact on
  intra-community relations
• Enthusiasm for participation in Community
  Portraits

17
Local Nets Social Capital
FOR MORE INFO...

• Reports available from SCHEMA Website
• http//www.stir.ac.uk/schema

Centre for Research Development in Learning
Technology, Faculty of Human Sciences, University
of Stirling, Stirling FK9 4LA, Scotland. http//ww
w.stir.ac.uk/crdlt